Living on the West Coast all our lives “historic” means anything from the early 1900s, ancient history for us is the CA Gold Rush and the Spanish Missions. So, we are really excited to get to spend some time on the East Coast and soak up some US History this summer. We spent 5 nights at the Hampton public piers (an amazing value!) and did some exploring while we were there.
First we rode bikes to Fort Monroe and spent a morning cruising around there and visiting the museum. We learned that one of the fort engineers was Robert E. Lee, that after the Civil War Jefferson Davis was imprisoned there, and that things that are that old may be unstable! As we were walking though a brick came falling from the ceiling just one room over from us!
To continue our history exploration we decided to rent a car to visit the Colonial Triangle – Jamestown, Yorktown and Williamsburg. The first day we went to the Jamestown Settlement and learned about the first English colony in Virginia. We toured replicas of the ships they arrived on and Ryan asked me what I’d think of a 4 ½ month voyage on one of those. Well let me just say there is a reason I insisted on a catamaran! We then went through the replicas of the old settlement and got to hold the muskets and visit the cook house…all the fun touristy stuff. We also went through the museum and learned more about the interactions between the English and the Native Americans. All I can say about that is WOW and I’m sorry. And I’m sure they toned it down quite a bit. We also learned more about the story of Pocahontas as well – it is exactly as Disney described. 😉
Once we were done with the museum we headed to Yorktown for a late lunch. There wasn’t much going on there but we had a delicious lunch and walked Stanley around a bit. Ryan saw a steel boat at the Yorktown docks that he had been drooling over in Beaufort and that was pretty much the highlight of Yorktown.
The next day we visited Colonial Williamsburg. I got a distinct Disney vibe as we followed the well marked route to the visitor center. We parked there, bought our tickets, and “headed back in time”. The first building we toured was the Governors Palace. It took a bit of our excitement away when we realized that the entire village had been rebuilt around 1932 by Rockefeller and weren’t the original structures. I guess they were able to excavate all the old basements though so the village had the same layout as it did in the 1700s. The tours through the houses were interesting as the guides were all in costume and told the stories of people who had lived there. We ended our day with a tour of the capital building with our guide walking us through how Virginia and the US declared independence from England. Quite exciting stuff….I wonder how it will all turn out….
Quite a trip! You’ll be glad to have these blogs to look back on when your trip is over….I know, difficult to imagine that right now! 🙂
Marc wants to know what kind of motor you have on the catamaran.
Thanks Cherie! We are enjoying ourselves. 🙂 Tell Marc that we have 2 3-cylinder 40hp Yanmar diesels. Say hi to Marc and Gabe!
I remember sitting in Yorkshire pub years ago, talking with some farmers who were in town. As we were tipping a pint, the conversation turned to home remodelling. I talked of permits and contractors, and they described just getting out the tools and punching thru the 18 inch thick stone walls of their old farmhouse for an addition. I asked how old the building was, and they replied, “oh only a couple hundred years”! We’ve got a very ‘westward expansion’ view of time — a house is old at 20 years in California, 200 years in New York, and 2000 years in the original York!
Sounds like you’re having a great time. Williamsburg & Jamestown made a lasting impression on me the first time in my teen years on family vacation, and I enjoyed it all over again when we took Zoya there, as I focused more on the story the ‘re-enacters’ were trying to tell, and it’s implications for the current struggles around the world. I recommend checking out the shipyards in Norfolk and touring the USS Wisconsin — the last battleship — which is still under commission with the US Navy. Another impressive steel boat.
Will you be getting up to Washington DC? There’s so much to see & do there. How’s Stanley when you foray into town? Does he stay on the boat? and not get into mischef?
Sad thing is I don’t remember as much history as I should from my education, I really just was engaged with it growing up on the West Coast where it wasn’t palpable. We will not be going up the Potomac in early summer as we are headed to Long Island Sound, but may head up when we come back through waiting for November to push south. There is a lot to see and learn in all the little towns around the Chesapeake, it seems each place even with less than 1000 residence there will be a staffed museum that has local history going back 200-300 years.
Hope all is well at the Refinery! I remember you were speaking about a trip out east later this year . . .
I wish I could have gone to Jamestown. I loved Williamsburg, even though the buildings are reconstructed. Just a great historical site. It was on my bucket list!