Up again to visit Omar on the 10th floor for breakfast! He is such a welcoming presence at this hotel. After completing some blog posts to catch up, we were off first to the National Historic Site of Yorktown Battlefield. It looked interesting to me (in fact this whole area is fascinating) and when we entered the visitors centre we were met with a wonderful volunteer that told us about the drives we could take around the battlefields. She also asked to have our admission fees waived, as we are Canadians and the government does not provide the Access Pass to Canadians which she thinks is bad as Canada gives their Access Pass to Americans! I did not know that! It was actually the ranger at the admissions desk who did it – he has a lifetime membership to the National sites as he is a veteran, so he just said we could be admitted under his pass. Very nice thing to do! We looked around, the visitors centre was small and then left to do the drive. There were 2 drives – one went from A-E and the other one places F – K if I remember correctly. Sometimes it was hard to see the marker however we persevered. They also had an app that provided recorded information about each site that one visited which was really awesome as we could play it on the car radio. We then visited the following sites:
- First Tour – Red line
- A – British Inner Defense Line
- B – Grand French Battery (there were no guns displayed there)
- C – Second Allied Siege Line (again no guns)
- D – Redoubts 9 and 10
- E – Moore House
- F – Surrender Field
- Second Tour – Yellow line
- G – American Artillery Park
- H – General Washington’s Headquarters
- I – French Cemetery
- J – French Artillery Park (there were cannons here)
- K – French Encampment Area
- L – Untouched Redoubt
Here are the pictures of the tours along with a couple extra signs from in between –
After touring that large area and learning about the war between the British/French and Americans with assorted other people we just had enough time to visit one more place – was it going to be Jamestown Settlement or the Jamestown Historic Village? Based on the fact that I like ships and recreation type places over archaeological digs (which is more what the Village is) we settled on the Settlement (get that pun dad?) We only had 90 minutes to visit however I was sure it could be done! I asked at the entrance counter if the ships were wheelchair accessible and I was told yes – so we paid to go in. Not sure what the gentleman at the front desk was thinking about – he charged Andrew a Senior rate and me an Adult rate. Go figure.
The grounds are not large, however they contain a Virginia Indian (yes this is correct to say) settlement for the Paspahegh, who speak the Algonquin language – which this language runs all the way up to Canada. It was very interesting and when you went into their abodes, they even smelled like fire had been in them! There were volunteers appropriately dressed talking to other visitors however we did not stick around as I wanted to see the ships that were advertised as part of the display. We walked down to the waterfront, past the fort which is also part of the display to see the ships. Hmm. Something is wrong. These are NOT accessible! Yes there is a ramp but there also are stairs and a mobility device will not work on them! A bit frustrated, I asked a man who looked like he was wearing ID for the Settlement and sure enough he worked there and was in charge of the ship display. He had only worked there for 2 weeks and confirmed that the 3 ships, of which 2 were on the dock and the other one out for re-furbishment, were definately not accessible and a ticket should not have been sold to me. He offered to walk us back to the reception building in order to get it solved. I mentioned that we wanted to visit the fort and the museum quickly prior to 5pm when the museum closed. He was really nice and walked us to the fort, gave us an overview and then said he would be back to take us to the museum and to get me a refund! Wow – what customer service!
The fort area was really interesting – especially the person dressed up as a doctor from the 1700’s and had a surgeon’s kit! It was a small example of a village but an excellent one at that. Our friend then met us and showed us where the museum was, took us to the reception so I could receive my refund and then walked us back to the correct museum door to start the visit. He had just retired from the Navy and had been stationed on the ship Wisconsin, which is now part of the Nauticus museum in Norfolk. I think he was a little disappointed when I told him that we had not had the time to get to the museum, however we had seen the ship as we had driven by it. He then told me that he has his “Wisconsin” reunion for the ship coming up on Saturday, September 21st at the Sheraton Hotel which is nearby. They have reunions every 2 years. I laughed and he looked at me strangely and I said we have been staying at that hotel and there is a JAG conference going on right now, which I think ended today, however the Chef told me that he has 2 big events this weekend! What a small world I said. He was really looking forward to going to the event. He then left us at the museum entrance and we went and zoomed through checking it out! The display actually reminded me a bit of being in the Royal Victoria museum in Victoria, BC with the way they had the display cases etc – different subject however similar feel. Again, a VERY good exhibit that I wish we could have spent longer at however thems the brakes! Then it was off to the store to find more stickers for my sticker project where I was successful and we left at 4:59pm just on time!
Saying we were SO CLOSE to Williamsburg, we could not leave the area without driving through it on the way home from Jamestown. It was only supposed to be 10 minutes out of our way. However Google Maps had other ideas and instead of sending us to downtown Williamsburg, it decided to send us to a housing development called “Colonial Williamsburg”! I wonder how many people have made that mistake! We corrected Google, which 97.5% of the time is good in North America, and ended up downtown checking out the main street, the prestigious university, William & Mary and cruising the residential streets back to the highway into Norfolk.
On the way back into Norfolk, I had read and checked out on the internet, a restaurant that has a good gluten free menu called Bakers Crust so we decided to check it out! Well, this time the internet did not lie – the beautiful caprese salad and a shrimp, real crab and asparagus pasta were awesome! Andrew had a pulled pork sandwich with some very awesome tasting fries for his dinner. As tomorrow is a travel day, we also invested in a GF pizza (forgot to take a pic!) to go. Oh and also we had vanilla bean ice cream with chocolate sauce for desert! That has not been happening much on this vacation so it was time to imbibe!
Okay, now we are full, it is back to the hotel to get some sleep as tomorrow is one of our longer driving days to Washington, DC!