Yorktown & Jamestown, Virginia
Today we had a chance to explore two different parts of United States history in an extraordinary way. We started the morning alongside historic Yorktown and had a tour of Colonial National Park. An excellent park ranger guided us through the battlefield site and brought history alive with her detailed description of the last critical battle in the American Revolution. We walked in the fields trying to imagine what an incredible effort General George Washington and his troops gave to defeat British General Lord Cornwallis. After the tour we had a chance to explore the charming and quaint Yorktown before lunch.
In the afternoon we travelled to Jamestown. We had a chance to discover and explore historic Jamestown, North America’s first permanent English settlement. Our first stop was an active archaeological dig site where Dr. Bill Kelso, the archaeologist who painstakingly discovered the remnants of the original fort at Jamestown, greeted us. He refused to believe that the fort was lost to the river and has been uncovering the area since 1994. As a rare courtesy to Lindblad Expeditions, Dr. Kelso led us down special steps built for a visit by Queen Elizabeth II onto the site of the current dig. He told us about how archaeologists work throughout the summer to collect artifacts from the 1607 James Fort excavation to gain a better understanding of what life was like in the original fort.
The tour moved onto another exclusive opportunity for Lindblad Expeditions with a behind the scenes glimpse of the artifact conservatory. The head curator told us about the various bits of pottery, shells, coins, metal work, and even turtle shells that have been unearthed at the site. One of the archivists showed us a sword hilt that was being processed before being displayed at a special Smithsonian exhibit next year. It was an incredible opportunity to have history come alive right before our very eyes!
Today we had a chance to explore two different parts of United States history in an extraordinary way. We started the morning alongside historic Yorktown and had a tour of Colonial National Park. An excellent park ranger guided us through the battlefield site and brought history alive with her detailed description of the last critical battle in the American Revolution. We walked in the fields trying to imagine what an incredible effort General George Washington and his troops gave to defeat British General Lord Cornwallis. After the tour we had a chance to explore the charming and quaint Yorktown before lunch.
In the afternoon we travelled to Jamestown. We had a chance to discover and explore historic Jamestown, North America’s first permanent English settlement. Our first stop was an active archaeological dig site where Dr. Bill Kelso, the archaeologist who painstakingly discovered the remnants of the original fort at Jamestown, greeted us. He refused to believe that the fort was lost to the river and has been uncovering the area since 1994. As a rare courtesy to Lindblad Expeditions, Dr. Kelso led us down special steps built for a visit by Queen Elizabeth II onto the site of the current dig. He told us about how archaeologists work throughout the summer to collect artifacts from the 1607 James Fort excavation to gain a better understanding of what life was like in the original fort.
The tour moved onto another exclusive opportunity for Lindblad Expeditions with a behind the scenes glimpse of the artifact conservatory. The head curator told us about the various bits of pottery, shells, coins, metal work, and even turtle shells that have been unearthed at the site. One of the archivists showed us a sword hilt that was being processed before being displayed at a special Smithsonian exhibit next year. It was an incredible opportunity to have history come alive right before our very eyes!
