America’s Historic Triangle

Located in Virginia: Jamestown, Williamsburg, and Yorktown are known as America’s Historic Triangle. We spent two weeks here, but really only scratched the surface of what there is to see and do.

We started at the Yorktown Battlefield where we learned about the final major battle of the American Revolution. The boys loved it! They got to hear a canon being fired not once, but several times during our visit. You know how boys are with big guns…the couldn’t get enough of it.

If you head into the Visitor Center, you can see the Witness Cannon they have on display. What’s a Witness Cannon? It’s a cannon that was actually at the battle. It’s genuine. You need to say that last part in your best Southern accent. Really drawl it out and add a few syllables. You can even see where a cannonball hit the Witness Cannon.

We love the battlefield auto tours so we grabbed one in the Visitor Center and headed out to see the battlefield. There were a few other families out doing the tour, but not many. We basically had the place to ourselves. Which for us was great…we could take our time at each stop and talk about what we’d learned on the auto tour.

The countryside in Virginia is beautiful! But Guys, some of these roads weren’t made for RVs. We were on a few that left us a little…puckery…if you know what I mean. We really enjoyed our time in Virginia. It was nice to get back to some Southern hospitality after being away from it for so long.

Historic Jamestown was next on our list. This is the site of America’s first permanent English settlement. You don’t really get to see anything that was actually there. The ruins are all buried to keep them protected. But, the NPS has built a few structures to give guests an idea of what it might have looked like. It was neat to be there…but I think next time we’ll check out the Jamestown Settlement, which is the State Park version of the one we went to.

The last place we went was Williamsburg. We had some good friends fly all the way from Texas to Virginia to visit with us and they went with us to Jamestown and Williamsburg.

We toured the Governor’s Palace where we got to see how the king’s representative lived. It was kind of weird talking about kings and their direct influence of America for the boys.

The whole house was impressive, but I liked the entrance the best. Check out all of those weapons! All of the weapons were on display not only to show wealth and to intimidate, but also to keep them in easy reach when needed. Can you imagine having to keep all of those polished and cleaned?

All of the bright colors surprised me. We were so used to seeing faded or muted colors in all of the State Capital Buildings, so the vivid colors were unexpected. The photo above was in the ballroom. The rug would be rolled up and stored to the side anytime dancing happened.

I’m happy to report none of us got lost in the maze! It was close…I’m soooo bad at these things…but we all made it out unscathed.

Some of my favorite things about Williamsburg were all of the artisans. We got to roam around and poke our heads into the many wonderful period era shops. Most of the historic interpreters did a good job of staying in character without making it weird or awkward.

Nicholas and Alex were kind enough to demonstrate the pillory for us. I may or may not have taken my time getting this picture to give them a little taste of what that punishment would be like. ha!

One of the highlights of the whole two weeks was the tour through the capitol building at Williamsburg. Our tour guide was amazing! She was knowledgeable, entertaining and came across as genuinely passionate. If all history lessons were as good as hers, I would’ve done so much better in school.

We had to check out the jail. The one above was a bit morbid with the coffin in it. See the steps on the right side of the picture? That’s the toilet. We all decided we’d rather not have to stay in those accommodations.

We were close to Richmond, VA so we took the opportunity to check out the VA State Capitol Building. The VA State Capitol Building had a nice surprise. From the outside you can’t see the dome…but, surprise! There’s a dome!

We had a great time in Williamsburg. We will definitely be back to visit VA again.

See y’all down the road!!

#easterloop2016