Today was a short travel day--only four hours. But we took all day and had several cool experiences. The boys said the Country Inn had the best breakfast so far this morning.
We stopped first at Natural Bridge, which is a town that features one of the 7 Natural Wonders: a 255 foot high natural rock bridge that spans a valley, once occupied by the Monacan Indians.
There is a lot here, including a gift shop, wax museum, toy museum, large caverns, indian village, and other attractions.
We walked quite a ways, and saw some interesting things. I had Sherry take this picture, in hopes that my entomologist niece Audrey would identify it for me.
While we were walking along the creek, Forrest saw this freshwater turtle, with a shell that was about 10 inches in diameter, stick his head up out of the water.
This is the only remaining Mulberry Tree on the property, and the berries are ripe and sweet. Thomas Jefferson bought this property for $2.40 (157 acres), and imported these trees from shoots he had brought from France and planted at Monticello. We didn't find any Mulberry trees at Monticello.
Ian and Jeremy enjoyed the toy museum. Especially the dioramas like this one, which excited Ian. He will probably always be a little boy when it comes to things like this!
We also visited the indian village, where artisans showed us the indians' methods of basket making, buildings, tools and weapons. We learned the women were the better fishermen. The men would take their arrows and spears and try to shoot the fish. The women would form two rows and walk towards each other in the stream, "herding" the fish together until they could just pick up 20 or so at a time. The man who told us this story had a twinkle in his eye, but it was entertaining, nonetheless.
After Natural Bridge we went on down the road to Staunton (pronounced with a soft 'a' sound like "Stanton"). This is the home of the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library. We learned a lot about Wilson, who was from Staunton.
The boys each completed a scavenger hunt, even though we only had about an hour there. They got a bumper sticker, a $100,000 bill with Wilson's image on it, and a Wilson campaign button for their trouble.
After the Wilson Library, we were pressed to get to Monticello. The guidebooks don't explain things very well. You can get tickets until 5:00, but must be there 30 minutes early for the mansion tour. It turns out they are good until 7:oo. We left Staunton at 3:20, thinking we were short on time. This precipitated some confusion and pressure that almost resulted in an accident and led to a frustrated explosion from Forrest that became a learning experience for the boys. I guess this is part of the reason why we take these trips--to learn about how we deal with adversity and reconcile with others.
Our mansion tour at Monticello was for 6:10, so we ran over to Charlottesville and the University of Virginia and explored the Rotunda. Jefferson founded this University and situated the various colleges around this large rotunda building in the center. It became a model for colleges around the world.
Back at Monticello, we took the shuttle up the hill to the mansion. What a view Jefferson had from his home. This is the hardwood Virginia forest, looking east.
This is the front of Monticello. Jefferson designed all the buildings here, since he enjoyed dabbling in architecture. He was influenced by the Greek architecture, as you can see by the columns.
Jefferson was very well read, and very much a renaissance man, dabbling in botany and science as well as politics.
We ended the tour by walking down to the family graveyard, where Jefferson is buried. This was late in the day, and we stopped for fast food at KFC (the boys were happy). We didn't actually arrive at our hotel in Williamsburg until about 10:20 pm.
We are looking forward to staying for two nights in the same place!
The weather cooperated magnificently today. The predicted severe storms dissipated, and we had mostly warm but not unbearable temperatures (although it did reach 100 in Charlottesville). Regardless, we thanked God for the great weather!
