Our First Full Day

The forecast was for hot humid weather, and that is what we got. But it did not stop us from our first full day.

We started out after breakfast at the Williamsburg Lodge driving down the Colonial Parkway to Jamestown.  The site is owned half by the National Park Service and half by Preservation Virginia (formerly APVA). Every time I go there is more of the original fort uncovered.

 Here is one of the major sites of excavation for this summer. You can read more about it here.

Bill Kelso, the man who thought it was really worth looking for the Jamestown landing site, was there working when we visited.

It was close to 100 degrees.

Our next stop was for lunch at the Jamestown Settlement. This is the site of a memorial to the Jamestown settlers and a reconstruction of the fort, a local Powhatan village, and the three ships, the Godspeed, the Susan Constant, and the Discovery. 

The Native American reconstructed village.

The sun came down hard by the docks, it was 1:00, and just about as hot as we could stand. I must admit, since this is a place we visit every year on the Castilleja 8th grade trip, I did not feel too guilty cutting my visit short and spending most of my time in the air conditioned museum. It really is a fantastic museum, renovated completely in 2007 for the 400th anniversary.

 I walked through the reconstructed fort, but I did not stay long. I did stop in the church, and thought about how men must have felt coming from England, and maybe having seen churches there, like King's College Chapel in Cambridge, and then to come to what they saw as wilderness and listen services in a rough wooden church like this one. In some ways the small global world seems to start with this kind of change. A small group of Europeans coming to the Americas, and settling in, changing the world, but not living long enough to see the results.

We took the bus back to Williamsburg and took a short break. I came back to the room and happened to catch the exciting finish of Stage 15 of the Tour de France. We met back up at 4:30 and Paige took us on a tour of some of the historic district.

We walked from Brick House Tavern, where I am staying, and many of the other teachers are too, down to the Governor's Palace.  We were hot.

I imagine this guy was even hotter.

We had a wonderful dinner at Christina Campbell's Tavern, and then finished the day reading and discussing documents in the basement of Brick House Tavern.