We are in Charlottesville, Virginia, home of 3 of the first 5 presidents of the United States: Jefferson, Madison and Monroe. Washington was also from Virginia, but from the eastern part. Adams, who was the second president, was from Massachusetts.
We visited Montpelier, the home of James and Dolley Madison. James was the fourth president of the United States. He’s known as the father of the Constitution. He deeply researched self-governance while the country struggled under the Articles of Confederation and then championed the idea of a constitutional convention, even persuading George Washington to attend. The convention adopted many of his ideas.
James was raised and died at Montpelier. Dolley had to sell the home after James’ death and it passed through several hands before it was purchased by one of the DuPonts in the early 1900’s. The DuPonts massively remodeled the estate, but their daughter, who lived there until she died, left it to the National Trust to be restored to how it was during James and Dolley’s retirement from Washington.
Behind the house was a touching statue of James and Dolley Madison.
The pictures show the dense forestation of the area. Much of the area is cleared for fields and buildings, but this is a forested area of the country. We are continually driving down roads that are tree tunnels. With all the twists and turns, it’s easy to suppose that many roads follow the trails and footpaths that preceded actual roads. From the highway, the mountains and hills are covered in trees, with the valleys sheltering towns and farms.
The area around Montpelier is filled with large horse and cattle farms and small homes. We passed several other homes that probably date back to the same period as Montpelier, notable for the number of chimneys they had.
When I last posted, we were in Ohio, traveling the hills of southern Ohio. We crossed the Ohio River into West Virginia and the mountains.
This is when we thank our farmer friends for strongly suggesting a 1-ton diesel pickup. Steve’s big blue truck (our granddaughter Maria’s name for it) pulls the trailer nicely.
We stayed Monday night at Little Beaver State Park in West Virginia. The view out the back was quite pleasant, mainly because there weren’t many other campers.
The next morning we got up and drove about 1.5 hours to Lost World Caverns. I’m not terribly fond of caves, but Steve is and this one had some good reviews. They had a couple of llamas (I think) out front who had interesting haircuts.
The cave had a 45-minute self-guided tour and I thought I could manage that, so I joined Steve. It had a lot of interesting formations; I was most intrigued by the ones that looked like folds of fabric and not the normal stalactites.
I’ll probably skip the next few caves we visit, but Steve will take lots of pictures.
We’re headed next to Williamsburg and hope to visit the plantation on which Steve’s six-times-great-grandfather grew up.
Deb
