Ten Day Historical Trip, Day Four: Mount Vernon

Having been to Washington D. C. twenty plus times, I had gotten to the point where I believed there was not anything new to see, until a few years ago, when I found this delight. Now it is one of my very favorite places to go. The gardens. The woodsy walks. All the animals busily grazing or pecking. Say nothing of the house and grounds, where truly historical moments took place. To stand where Washington and Jefferson met regularly. To look upon the table where house and home met country. It’s unreal, really. But, back to those gardens. They are some of the best I’ve seen–besides being massive (which they are) –done in the English style with neat borders and straight paths. Meticulously trimmed fruit trees and carefully trimmed bushes line each path, separating one part of the garden from the other, all of which are surrounded by a chest-high brick wall, separating garden from garden. Now. This time I was here in late winter/ early spring, so not much was going on in the way of growing things, but having been here at other times, I can assure you it is a pleasure to visit any time of year. And what lacked in flowers was more than made up for in baby lambs and chicks.

Washington was quite the farmer. His methods on soil improvements (use of manure, among other things) and crop rotation are still used today. And I love his thoughts on ‘living fences’, a method of using fast growing trees and bushes instead of timber–which, he found, used up far too much of his surrounding woods for his liking.

He loved his farm; it is evident is every path and garden. It was home to him, so much so, he chose to be buried there. You can see that as well on your visit–the resting place of our first president and his first lady.

Now. For the rest of it. I chose not to visit the museum and also did not watch the forty-minute film shown there. I have done both before and did not feel the need to repeat it. If it is your first time visiting, I would recommend both. There is a very nice gift shop there as well, half of it being what you’d expect in the way of t-shirts and coffee mugs and bobble heads, but there is a second, separate shop, which caters to those who enjoy the finer things in the way of garden seeds, some of the good stuff from the first president’s own distillery (located right down the road), linens, cookbooks, and other fine household wares.

Nothing in the store tempted me, however, and I had a reservation to keep at the Inn, one of two choices (the other being the food court). Now. My expectations were high. I had been promised (on their website) that I would be able to “savor the flavors of early America”. Well. I was seated in a large, mainly empty room which appeared to be on the ready to seat a busload (which it soon did). There was no feeling of an Inn or any intimacy at all. Honestly, it felt like a food court disguised as a restaurant. I looked at the menu. There were a few offerings which hinted at a historical origin. Personally, I had been hoping for all that Martha Washington’s table was famous for: the daily hams, the fresh-from-the-garden veggies, the fish pulled straight from the Potomac. The pies. I ended up ordering Maryland crab chowder. It was…okay. Nothing worth re-creating here.

Unsatisfied with the meal, but completely contented by the walk around the garden, I dabbed my mouth with my napkin, and left Mount Vernon. Onto Williamsburg.