We are going cultural today, instead of going bush. We decided to have a look at Thomas Jefferson's residence Monticello (which means Little Mountain in ... well, you probably would be able to guess in what language).
Thomas Jefferson was the 3rd president of USA (two terms) and ...
- the principal author of the Declaration of Independence.
- designed and fathered the University of Virginia,
- arranged the Louisiana purchase which doubled the size of the United States,
- was the first US Minister to France (we assume that means ambassador if today's terms)
- was the first US Secretary of State
- etc...
Jefferson was also a slave keeper who had up to 500 slaves at times. The historians say he struggled with the concept of slavery but balanced it with commercial reality, and his lifestyle needs, and decided it was all too controversial so did nothing about it.
Monticello is just outside the town of Charlottesville in Virginia which is some 1.5 hours drive south from where we are staying in Luray. So, after breakfast we are on our way this beautiful and warm spring morning.
Monticello is an Unesco World Heritage Site, the only home of any US president that has received that qualification. It covers 5,000 acres today and is owned and maintained privately by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation.
Here is the big man himself. No, no, no, not the guy to the right...
Monticello doesn't look too imposing from the front, but it actually has 4 storeys. Thomas Jefferson (or TJ) designed most of the house himself. From what we learnt of him today, in modern language you would have called him a tinkerer.
Here is Monticello from the back. We bet that there would have been some parties on this lawn...
Again, Monticello from another angle. The pond in the foreground was for keeping locally caught fish alive until they were served for dinner. TJ liked it fresh...
This is the northern pavilion that you could see on the far left on the previous picture. TJ used to live in the southern pavilion, first by himself and then with his wife once he was married before the construction of the house was completed.
There is a whole world underneath the building and underneath the boardwalk that you can see on this picture.
We went on a well organised and informative tour to see the inside ground floor of Monticello, but unfortunately we were not allowed to take any pictures.
So here are a couple of pictures from the website. The Entrance Hall was like a mini museum.
The office was full of scientific equipment and maps. He was also obsessed with time and there were clocks everywhere in the house.
Underneath the building (where Di is standing), it was free for all and no restrictions on photography.
This is a reconstruction of the kitchen. Di's face just lit up when she walked in here. The cooking style was described as "French Virginian". He had slaves and servants trained and given French recipes to follow when they were cooking.
Hans liked this little piece of engineering. This is a wine shute of sorts. A slave would load a fresh bottle of wine in the shute as the master rang the bell and the bottle would end up in the living room upstairs. Nice.
He was a man of good taste, Mr Thomas Jefferson.
Beautiful gardens. Di used the word "beautiful" so many times that we lost count...
The Botanic Man... Not. Just confused... What's the big deal with all these flowers?
This must have been a bloody big tree. Or the guy standing inside its remains is tiny...
Monticello was built and Thomas Jefferson resided there during the slave era and next to the main building was Mulberry Row where the slaves lived. Not much remains from those days today. The rocks below show the footprint of one of those residences.
Mulberry Row from another angle. The lady on the picture had nothing to do with Monticello's past.
Monticello was pretty much self contained in its hey days, with orchard and growing vegetables...
... And vines. Yep, Thomas Jefferson had good taste.
Thomas Jefferson is buried within the grounds of Monticello and so are most of his descendants.
After having got our cultural fix, we decided to drive into Charlottesville for lunch. The town is surprisingly nice and with a huge University of Virginia campus within its bounds (thanks TJ) it felt very much alive and trendy. Downtown there is a long pedestrian mall in the centre of the historic area and the council has provided free wifi so you see plenty of people enjoying the sun with iPads and laptops.
In the mall area we found a dumpling place there called Marco and Lucas that was very popular with the lunching locals. You could also sit outside so we decided to give it a go. The food, dumplings and hot and sour soup, was all very nice and cheap so we went back to get some more. Total cost $12 for two of us.
A couple of location shots up and down from Charlottesville's pedestrian mall from where we enjoyed our lunch.
After lunch, we wandered a bit, had a gelato each and of course, a self portrait.
We couldn't stay for too long as parking where we were was only allowed for an hour so on the hour we were back at the car and drove home, an alternative road to the east of Blue Ridge Mountains via Sperryville where we were yesterday.
Back around 4.30pm at the Best Western in Luray, and after a rest we have another home cooked microwave meal, Di's sludge speziale this time Jambalya style. Yummy.
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