Historic Tavern in Boydton, VA.

Thursday, September 26, 2013

It's just a few miles west on SR 58 from North Bend Park to Boydton, VA.  We stopped in downtown Boydton so Kitty could check out a quilt shop.  While she was in the quilt shop, I walked over to get a closer look at the historic tavern.

Boydton is a very small town with a population of about of around 450 people.  It is the county seat for Mecklenburg county.  One of the main reasons such a small town was selected as the county seat was because it had a tavern.  You've got to admire folks that select a county seat because it has a tavern!

The town founder, Alexander Boyd Sr., migrated here from Scotland, and built the original building back in 1790.  Since then, it has evolved into a rambling frame structure. But, the tavern was a very popular gathering place.  During the civil war, Confederate troops used the tavern as a gathering place.  The tavern closed late in the 19th century, and it was converted into a boarding school, and later into apartments.

Inside, much of the structure has been restored.  On my tour, I was shown a couple of these areas inside that have been untouched for about 200 years. The original floor has no end-to-end joints.  So, if the room was 30 or 40 feet long, the floor boards were one continuous length.  A few pieces of furniture are believed to be original and there are paintings of various members of the Boyd family.  Alexander Boyd, Sr., was a prominent leader in this area until his untimely death while serving as county judge in the court house.

It is believed that the early structure also served as a court house until the county's formation in the 1830's. However, this is only speculation at this time.

Since 1988, the care and restoration of the structure has been under the guidance of Boyd Tavern Foundation. It is now listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

Heading to Kerr Reservoir, Boydton, VA.

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

We are all packed up ready to leave Bull Run Regional Park and head south. Just one little problem is preventing us from pulling the 5th wheel out of the park.  We have a full hook up site, but can not dump our tanks because the ding bat that made this site has the sewer drain up hill from our drain valve.  They must not be aware of the fact that water does not run up hill without some help!  We spent a couple of hours trying to jockey the 5th wheel so our drain valve would at least be the same height as the sewer drain, but to no avail. Just to make it more interesting, the dump station at the campground was closed for repairs. (They probably had to lower it! Ha!)

Kitty checked at the office and they said we could just pick any open site and dump our tanks.  We did that, except the sites were all tilting away from the sewer drain making it impossible to drain all the fluids from our tank.  By now it is late morning and we have a 200 mile travel day ahead of us.  So, we dumped as much as we could and proceeded down the highway.

Our destination is North Bend Park located on the Kerr Reservoir near the town of Boydton, Virginia.  You are probably wondering where Boydton is located.  That's simple, it's between South Hill and Clarksville, VA.!!  More percisely, it is about 20 miles west of I-85 and just a couple miles north of the Virginia and North Carolina border.

Boydton has some interesting history, but will share that later.  Here's what it looks like at North Bend Park COE.

This is our view of the lake.  It is just across the street, but the trees block most of our view.

 We took a walk along the shore line and took these pictures.

Oh yea, the bathrooms are really cool.  Each section of the campground has a very nice bath house with a residential type bathroom.  We have six shower rooms that have walk in showers, plenty of changing room, several places to put your stuff, a sink, and a toilet.  They are very clean and modern.

The campground is well laid out, sites are reasonably level, ours has electric and water hook ups.  We like this place so much we plan to spend twelve nights here.  Then, our next destination will be South Carolina.

I will have some interesting tid bits regarding the history of Boydton in the next blog.

George Washington's Estate, Mount Vernon, VA.

Monday, September 23, 2013

Today we drove 45 minutes from our campground at Bull Run Regional Park in Centrefield, Virginia, to see our first President's estate in Mount Vernon.  Most of us tend to think of George Washington as a great General in the revolutionary war, a great leader, and a great president.  Indeed, he had all of those qualities and more. But, George Washington thought of himself as a farmer, more than anything.

He was a great farmer, indeed. He was an inventor and creative farmer as you will see in this blog.  He learned how to make his own fertilizer, and knew the importance of rotating his crops.

George's father built a small 1 1/2 story farm house in Mount Vernon overlooking the Potomac River in 1735.  When his father died, George's half brother inherited the house.  When his half brother died, George inherited the house in 1754 and began expanding over the next several years into a 21 room estate.

George and Martha's home restored to the way it was when they lived here.  The original house includes the front door and the two windows to the left and right of the door.

The next two picture were taken from their back yard overlooking the Potomac River.

 This was taken at the river's edge next to their dock.

In 1759, George married Martha Custis.  Martha's first husband died and left her a wealthy widow. When George and Martha married, they had 50 slaves working the farm.  Later, George built a grist mill and distillery just a few miles from their home.  Eventually, they had four adjoining farms with 8000 acres and 316 slaves.  Their estate includes several barns, nursery, several gardens, orchards, and I didn't count them, but there must be about twenty buildings on this property.

Upon George's death in 1799, Martha continued to manage the estate until her death.  The estate began to fall in disrepair after Martha died.  In 1858, the Mount Vernon Ladies Association purchased about 500 acres of the property and immediately began its restoration.  They made every effort to restore the home and property to the way it was when the Washington's lived here.  They even painted the rooms the same colors as the Washington's had and much of the furniture in the home is original.  I must say, they have done a marvelous job restoring this beautiful piece of property and all of its buildings.

George and Martha never had any children of their own, but Martha had four children from her previous marriage, and they ended up raising two of Martha's Grandchildren which George ended up adopting.  The statue below depicts George and Martha with the two grandchildren they raised, and, of course, Kitty! (she's not a statue...yet!)  The little boy in front of Kitty is George Washington Parke Custis.  He eventually built the Arlington House in Arlington, VA. Upon his death, his daughter would inherit the Arlington House and she was the wife of General Robert E. Lee, commanding the Confederate army during the civil war. Please see my blog dated September 23, 2013 "Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, VA."

This is a slave house on one of the Washington's farms.

This is Washington's Carriage

The Treading Barn Designed by George Washington

Inside the Tread Barn

This is where the women slaves & their children lived that worked on the main property.  The male salves had separate quarters similar to this.

George and Martha are both buried on the estate.  George is on the right and Martha is on the left.  In the middle is a door which opens into a vault where about twenty five members of the Washington family are inturned.

We have enjoyed our stay here in the DC area.  There is so much to see and do but there's also lots of people here "seeing & doing".  Although, we never had to wait in line to see anything more than a couple of minutes, and the weather has been great. We have really learned a great deal about the history of this great nation.

However, we are ready for some R & R.  So, in the morning we will pack up and head south.  Hopefully, somewhere nice and quiet with a beautiful lake!  Stay with us and find out where we land next!

Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, VA.

Sunday, September 22, 2013

One of the items on our list of things to do while we are staying at Bull Run Regional Park in Centreville, VA., is to see the changing of the guard at the tomb of the unknown soldiers in Arlington National Cemetery.  Little did we know, there are many interesting things to see at ANC, and we are happy to share some of the highlights with you.  Do you know how Arlington became a Cemetery and who was buried there first?  Well, read on and you'll find out.  It's not your normal run of the mill cemetery.  It's a very popular attraction in the Washington DC area.  After all, people are just dying to get into this place!  Ha!

The traffic in the DC area is always heavy and it can be a little stressful driving around here, so we took the Metro into Arlington.  The ride was fine, but all the cars were very crowded on Sunday morning with fans going to see the Washington Redskins football game.  But, our biggest problem on the Metro was trying to figure out which train to take and which track that train would be on.  I had printed some information from the Internet, which was helpful, but we were greatly confused, along with many other folks, until we got the hang of how things worked on the Metro. A few more signs here and there would have helped a lot!

Arlington National Cemetery is located on property that once belonged to General Robert E. Lee.  The Lee's truly loved this beautiful 1100-acre estate overlooking the Potomac River with a spectacular view of Washington DC.  Mary Custis Lee inherited the estate from her father, George Washington Parke Custis, (died in 1781) who is the adopted grandson of George Washington, the first President of the United States.

General Lee and his wife had very strong attachments to this estate, and when the civil war broke out, Lee, an officer in the Union Army at the time, had to decided which side he was going to fight for.  He felt so strongly about his ties to Virginia and this estate, he finally decided to fight for the Confederacy.  Many northerners felt Lee was a traitor and several people despised him for making that decision.

One of the biggest haters of Lee was the man in charge of finding more cemetery space for all of the dead soldiers from the civil war.  In order to assure that the Lees would never again occupy this estate, they began burying 2111 unknown soldiers from the civil war in Mrs. Lee's rose Garden!  Mary Lee was unable to pay the $92.07 property tax bill in person, so she sent her cousin.  But, the government refused to accept payment from some one else, and they declared the property in default, and confiscated the estate.  And now you know the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would say.

 

  This is Arlington House where the Lee's lived for decades before the civil war.

 The next two shots of Washington DC were taken from the hill at Arlington House.

These next few pictures are things we can all relate to.

This is the final resting place of JFK and the eternal flame.  He is one of only two US Presidents to be buried here.  Jackie is buried to the right, but not shown in this picture.

You may recall our blog dated September 20, 2013 with pictures of the Discovery space shuttle.  These next two pictures will bring back those awful moments when the Columbia and Challenger crew's made the ultimate sacrifice.

The changing of the guard at the tomb of the unknown soldiers is very impressive!  These dedicated young men guard this tomb 24-7 in all types of weather conditions.  The timing and precision that these guards exhibit is truly remarkable and makes you glad to be an American.  I wish I had taken a video instead of still shots.  It's really something special!

I hope you enjoyed these highlights.  There is much more to see at ANC, so you'll have to make the trip if you haven't done so already.  From ANC, we had planned to take the Metro into DC, but we didn't since we had spent several hours here and were dead tired!  Ha!

Renewing Old Friendships, Centreville, VA.

Saturday, September 21, 2013

One of the benefits of being full time travelers is we get to renew some old friendships once in a while.  While we were staying in Centreville,  Kitty contacted her high school friend Cathy to see if it would be possible to get together for a while.

Cathy gladly made the one hour drive from her home in Maryland to our campground at Bull Run Regional Park in Centreville.  Cathy's husband, Byron, was not able to make the visit due to his work schedule.

Cathy and Kitty attended high school in Madisonville, Kentucky, and both were in the school band.  They were close friends.  Cathy's father was the band director and Kitty has often spoken about the positive influence he had on every student involved in the band/music program at Madisonville High School.  He expected hard work & respect from the students but made the experience very memorable & fun.

Well, when these two gals get together, their lips never stop moving.  I was afraid I might have to do CPR on both of them because they never came up for air!  Me...I could barely get a word in edge wise! Ha!

But, it was a great visit and we look forward to seeing Cathy and Byron again in the near future.

L to R: Cathy and Kitty

The First Battle of the Civil War, Manassas, VA.

September 20, 2013

After leaving the Air & Space Museum in Chantilly, Virginia, we headed to Manassas (Bull Run) where the first battle of the civil war was fought.  We stopped at the visitors center and watched a 45 minute movie on the impact this battle had on the civil war and its effect on the people who lost family members in this battle.

Not only was this the first battle of the civil war, it is also the battle in which a famous Confederate General earned a nickname that stuck with him until he died a few years later.  Read more and find out who he was and how he earned his nickname.

It's the morning of July 21, 1861, Judith Carter Henry is bedridden and at home with her daughter and a black servant to attend to her needs.  Blind and in her 80's, she spent much of her time remembering how beautiful the rolling hills were surrounding her home.  Her son dropped by for a visit.  It was a pleasant, sunny, Sunday summer morning.

Suddenly, the deep-throated roar of a 30 pound Parrott rifle shattered the morning calm and the first battle of the civil war began!  Mrs. Henry's house was right in the middle of the action!  Her son and daughter carried her out of the house - mattress and all.  But, the old woman threw such a fit about leaving her house, they soon returned her to her home while the battle raged around them.  However, while they were gone, the Union had moved several canons on the hilltop beside her home and Confederate sharp shooters were already inside her home. A canon blasted the Henry home and Judith Carter Henry suffered a mortal wound.  She would be the first civilian killed in the civil war, and her house would eventually be completely destroyed.

This picture shows the position of the Union Canons atop Henry Hill and the Henry house in the background.  The house was rebuilt to look as it did in July of 1861, and the battlefields were restored to look as they did then, also.

This is a close up shot of the restored Henry house with a monument in the back "to all the brave Patriots who died here".

Before the first battle, both Union and Confederates thought this would be the first and only battle of the civil war.  Folks came to see the battle carrying picnic baskets, and were set to enjoy the colorful sites of the expected short battle. In just a few hours of heavy fighting on both sides, more than 900 men lay dead on the battlefield and it was obvious that this war was going to continue for a long time.

During this battle the Confederates were retreating when General Thomas J. Jackson arrived with fresh men.  General Jackson stood his ground.  Attempting to rally his men, Barnard Bee shouted, "There stands Jackson like a stone wall!  Rally behind the Virginians!"  This rallied the Confederates to stand their ground and that's how General Jackson became known as Stone Wall Jackson.  And now, as Paul Harvey would say, you know the rest of the story!

This is a monument to Stone Wall Jackson, with Captain Craig standing by.

In August 1862, the Union and confederate armies converged here to fight again known as the second battle at Manasses (Bull Run).  General Lee was commanding the Confederate army and outsmarted the Union during the battle and sent the Union army retreating back to Washington DC.  This victory gave Lee the idea that it was time to start fighting the civil war on Union soil and he made plans to move his army into Pennsylvania and would later be defeated at Gettysburg.  See my blog dated September 14th, "Civil War Turning Point, Gettysburg, PA.

After we left the battle field, we stopped at an RV dealer and purchased some new water hoses.  Ours were shot (and not by the Confederates or the Union) and needed to be replaced.  Then we headed to Logan's Steak House for our 33rd anniversary dinner.  I still can't believe we have been married 33 years already.  I guess the old saying "Time Flies When You're Having Fun", is very true in our case.

Next, we will enjoy a visit from an old friend and later visit Arlington National Cemetery.

Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, Chantilly, VA.

Friday, September 20, 2013

We are staying at Bull Run Regional Park in Centreville, Virginia, for the next several days.  We actually arrived here yesterday afternoon after making the two hour drive from Gettysburg, PA.

This is our home on wheels!

Today is a very special day because 33 years ago today we were married.  It doesn't seem possible...I mean, how could Kitty put up with me all that time!  It's a mircale!

Anyway, to celebrate our anniversary, we have several things we plan to do today.  The first is a short drive to the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum in Chantilly, VA.

That's Kitty standing at the entrance to the museum.

This place has all kinds of flying machines from some of the early Wright Brothers flying machines to some of the latest space travel machines, big and small, it has them all!  As you will see in some of these pictures, they really crammed a lot of machines into every available space.  You could spend days here and not see everything.  

In the interest of time and space, I am only going to show a tiny bit here in this blog.  I have three technical catagories to show you in this blog.  In highly technical aeronautical language, the three categories are big planes, space machines, and small personal size stuff.  (That's about as technical as I can get here!)

Here's a small sample of the big planes we saw.

stealth military aircraft.

The Concord

 This is the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb on Japan!

The Space Machines!

The Discovery flew 39 orbital missions and spent 365 days in space and traveled 150 million miles!  (That's a lot of miles between oil changes!)  The Discovery last flew in 2011 on the 133rd space shuttle mission.

These are the small personal size machines.  They all look like something you would see James Bond flying around in!

After our walking tour, we stepped into the attached Imax theater and saw a 43 minute movie on the Hubble Space Telescope narrated by Leonard DiCaprio.  This movie was a fascinating, up close look at the problems the astronauts had repairing the telescope.  The Hubble Space Telescope is thought to be the most important tool ever developed by man.  Not only have the scientist learned so much more about our planet, they have found things in space that they never knew existed and now have a better understanding of our universe, our neighboring planets, and the solar systems beyond the reach of earthly telescopes.

Naturally, there is so much more to see here than what I am able to shown you.  I am still sorting through all of the pictures we took while we were here!  We both found this to be a very interesting place, and wish we could spend a little more time here.  But, we must move on to our next adventure today.  Stay tuned!

Chocolate World, Hershey, PA.

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Since Kitty and I have long considered ourselves devout chocoholics, and the Hershey factory is only an hour away, no arm twisting was necessary to get us in the car for this trip!  At Hershey's Chocolate World, you can track cacao beans from the rain forest to the factory, see how chocolate is made and how they wrap those, oh so good, little Kisses!  You can also experiment in dessert creations, and sample different types of chocolate.  Ah... can we spend the night here?  Or, how about the rest of the week?  OMG, they'll  have to carry both of us outa here!!!

The tour we chose was the free tour, naturally.  It was a continuous tour much like you would find at Disney where you ride in a four seated cart and get on and off while it's moving.  The trick is to step onto the moving platform without falling.  I was proud of Kitty, she made it from the moving platform to the cart in a single bound!  She was so fast I didn't even have a chance to take a picture of her getting in the cart!  When it comes to chocolate, this gal can really move!

In addition to the cacao beans, the other key ingredient to make chocolate is milk.  This factory uses over 250,000 gallons of milk per day. So, to all those cows out there, we thank you for helping support our chocolate addiction!

This tour seemed to be geared more to the younger kids rather than us oldies.  It has a lot of animated characters like you see in these two pictures.

This cow has horns, and that's no bull! Ha!

 I was a little disappointed.  I expected a bunch of little people carefully making those delicious Chocolate Kisses and wrapping them individually by hand with loving care!  A machine makes those kisses and wraps them and puts them into bags!  What's up with that?  Darn, I was hoping to get one of those jobs!  Or, maybe be the quality guy that has to taste the chocolate all day long to be sure it's made right!  What a job that would be!  Oh well, I would probably end up weighing 900 pounds after the first week of employment here!  Guess I'll stay retired.

You know how your clothes smell after leaving some restaurants?  Well, our clothes smelled like chocolate when we left Chocolate World.  Heck, we may never wash those clothes again!  Despite our chocolate addiction, we only purchased one bag of Kisses.  Oh!  Did I mention it was a 50 pound bag?  Ha!