While staging in Virginia, we took the time to travel to Norfolk and visit the Nauticus Museum. Nauticus is quite the experience! It’s not just a nautical history museum, but also the home of the last battleship the Unites States built, the Wisconsin BB-64. Even better, thanks to The Boy’s EAA membership from his free Young Eagles flight and ASTC reciprocal benefits, we were able to visit for free! Nauticus
We found another Air and Space Museum to tour as we were passing through Virginia. The Virginia Air and Space Science Center in Hampton! Coming from the Seattle side of Washington State, we’ve had plenty of trips to The Museum of Flight. As such, we can’t help but use that as a yardstick to judge all others. In that measure, we kind of found the Virginia Air and Space Museum
One of our favorite science museums that we visited while staying in Virginia was the Mariners’ Museum in Newport News. Best of all, admission was only a dollar a person! This museum was a mix of maritime art, artifacts, and even whole boats. When I say boats, I do mean boats! They have one building that is full of different boats from different parts of the world. From canvas and
Our main reason for staying at Camp Cardinal RV Resort was its location. In eastern Virginia, it was right in the middle of many historic sites of Virginia. We spent the whole summer learning about our nation’s birth and growing pains. There are many agencies that operate the various locations we visited. The best way to organize them are The Historic Triangle, Preservation Virginia, and others. Interested in everything we
While visiting Virginia, we had the opportunity to visit many historic sites, from Colonial Williamsburg to Jamestown Settlement. One of the surprising gems of the area was the Berkeley Plantation, a little-known (to us at least) settlement, with a lot of history! The Historic Location Several companies sent out expeditions during the initial colonization of what was to become the United States. One such company, The Berkeley Company, was given
One of our last historic tours while staying in Virginia was touring the White House of the Confederacy and the Civil War Museum in Richmond. Civil War Museum The Civil War Museum was very well done and impressively unbiased. The museum was built in and around the ruins of the historic Tredegar Iron Foundry. This foundry had produced iron works for every major American conflict until its destruction by Hurricane
Cape Henry Lighthouse was the last and probably least well-done location toured during Preservation Virginia’s Homeschool Days. This could easily be explained away by the fact the lighthouse sits on Joint Expeditionary Base Fort Story and thus access isn’t as easy as the other four sites they showcased during the events. While they had themed activities, the activities they offered were a timed walking tour covering the base of the
On our third week of Preservation Virginia‘s home school days, we visited Bacon’s Castle. Regrettably, it seems like the quality of the locations was dropping off by this point. This day was shared with the Smith’s Fort Plantation site. The best part about this location was the two outdoor activities. One was planting a peanut that The Girl got to take home. The other was a demonstration of natural dyes
On our third week of Preservation Virginia‘s homeschool days, we visited Smith’s Fort Plantation. Regrettably, it seems like the quality of the locations was dropping off by this point. This day was shared with the Bacon’s Castle site. Being a split event, there were only two activities at this location. One was where the kids got to make their own whirlygigs. The other was where they could practice writing with
During Preservation Virginia‘s inaugural Homeschool Day events, we got to see and tour Patrick Henry’s home, called Scotchtown. This collection of buildings was the one-time home of the American Revolution politician and orator Patrick Henry. Though mostly reproductions, the main house is original. Patrick Henry is probably best known for his famous speech which ended in the lines “I know not what course others may take; but as for me,