Day Two

One more thing I forgot to mention in the previous post... We attended an evening program in Colonial Williamsburg which was a Ball in the Capitol. We were entertained by a puppet show and then watched a little period dancing.

Ok, now on to day two: Colonial Williamsburg

Not so many pictures from me this day. The sky was cloudy all day and I just really didn't feel up to taking pictures. I soooo need a blue sky background, which only happens when the air is dry.

I bought some postcards to compensate for my lack of photos, but that doesn't do my blog any good. Hopefully my mom will post a few pictures from that day. I know she took a bunch.

We started out on a garden tour of Colonial Williamsburg. We started out at the Palace... it was called that because one of the governors there spent lots and lots of money making the place rather palatial. The grounds were absolutely beautiful. It takes a lot of work to keep it looking good I'm sure.

One thing that really struck me were the size of holly bushes/trees. They were a good 15 or so feet tall and at least 10 feet wide and were trimmed cylindrically. I believe these dated back to the 1930s when they began restoration there.

We also saw the gardens at the Wythe House and the Geddy House. The Wythe House was a very small rendition of what was at the Governor's Palace. The Geddy House was a good example of a middle class garden in the later time period of the 1700s when it was more common for everyone to garden.

The rest of the day we wandered about street to street just looking at the houses and sites. Basically hopping from shady spot to shady spot. Probably the nicest place to hang out was the green leading to the Palace. There were planted a row of trees on both sides of the lawn. Included in these plantings were trees commonly called Cigar Trees. They were fascinating. I wonder if their seed pods hang on after the leaves drop.

Once it just got too danged hot, we opted for a drive up to Yorktown. It was a pleasant drive on the Colonial Parkway. It is very beautiful and you can tell it was built at least 40 years ago and was pretty much on the path as the old trails that connected Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown.

Along the historic drive of Yorktown Battlefields, I spotted a lot of deer. Of course we were driving at the right time to see them... late afternoon. Here's a shot of a couple of them.


From there, we drove to Yorktown itself and stopped at a riverside park there. Here's a couple of shots from there. One thing that really struck me is that the York River and the James River are nearly as wide as the San Francisco Bay is. It's incredible that these are rivers. To me, a river is a fast moving thing that's about 50 feet across max. Something you could cross with a fallen tree from shore to shore. Can you tell I'm a Westerner?

Yorktown bridge.


Pirate ship or something like that. It was kind of nice juxtaposed with the rest of the modern stuff.

That evening we went to two evening programs at Colonial Williamsburg and I highly recommend both of them. First we went to a Legends, Mysteries and Myths tour which took us into three of the buildings for ghost-type stories. It was great except for a couple of rude people who HAD to be the first in the door and just HAD to be on the end of a row. hello... if you are with a group of people with just enough seats for everyone and you want the aisle seat, then you shouldn't be the first ones in. In the second house I was so fed up with them... second row (i'm short you know and they weren't) and on the aisle that I just said "excuse me" and proceeded to step all over them. The rude only know rudeness, so what better way to communicate with them is to be rude myself.

The other evening program was Papa Said-Mama Said. This was fantastic. It was essentially stories passed on in the black oral tradition to give us the flavor of being in slaves quarters after the day was done. It was super educational, not to mention entertaining. It's the epitome of edutainment.