Since our move, we haven't had a lot of time to do anything outside of work that wasn't house renovation or unpacking boxes. Finally, we caught a bit of a break as my husband got an extra day off for Labor Day. We decided to do a mini trip to Colonial Williamsburg and Jamestown. I was there earlier this year for a very short time so I did not have much time to explore, but my husband and daughter had never been there so there was great excitement going into the weekend. With our seemingly usual bad luck since this move, our air conditioning went out, but thank God we were able to get it fixed quickly. That delayed our departure a bit, but we were able to get out the door by noon. After a few hours, we arrived at Jamestown no worse for wear and were able to purchase our tickets to go exploring. We wandered to the settlement first and were able to see how our forefathers lived along with a fun musket demonstration. My husband,especially, loved reading the signs (much to our exasperation), the gun demonstration and touring the ships. My little one was just excited to be out and about and learning about history. I don't know how much she truly understood, but as long as she enjoyed herself and learned something, I consider that a win. We then toured the Native American settlement and she was able to learn about how they dried skins and made their homes by drying and weaving reeds. She had a good time reading some of the signs, but you can't really expect an 8 year old to get too interested in that much history. She was very excited to see the different state flags and find the ones that were relevant to our family.
It was starting to get late and the museums were going to close soon, so we headed back to the indoor museum. We wandered around inside for a few more minutes before it got to closing time, learning about not only how they lived, but how the slaves were brought in and the relationship between the settlers and the Native Americans.
After we left, I really wanted to go to Frothy Moon brewery since we visited there the last time I was here, so we stopped by and had a couple of cold brews. I highly recommend visiting, if you are in the Williamsburg area...you wont regret cooling off with a nice frosty beverage there!
Unfortunately, dinner was less successful as we did not realize that we would need reservations for most of the more popular restaurants. Still we were able to get on the list for a restaurant called Food for Thought. Surprisingly, I was not the only one researching restaurants. If you've read previous posts, you know that (according to my husband) I put an extraordinary effort into researching restaurants before we go out to eat. This time Gary was researching as well and actually was very excited to go to this restaurant. The menu looked really interesting and, even more compelling, the names of many of the items were funny...I'm almost always drawn to funny.
We only had to wait about 25 minutes and voila, we had a table. The good news was they had plenty for our picky daughter to eat, so it was just a matter of deciding what we wanted to eat. Gary had the pot roast, which was good, but perhaps a bit overdone (texture was too soft). I ordered the Best of Both Worlds, which consisted of a small filet mignon, crab cake and two sides. I chose mashed sweet potatoes and steamed broccoli. The steak was perfectly cooked and the crab cake was surprisingly delicious and was made mostly of crab instead of bread crumbs. The remoulade that accompanied the crab cake was delicious and just a bit spicy which accented the flavors in such a way (if you're an Other Guys fan...you get it). The mashed sweet potatoes and steamed broccoli were also delicious. I would say that this restaurant was about a half a step away from being mediocre. Surprising based on my previous comments? I will explain. The menu was huge....probably too huge and vast. If you've watched any restaurant experts like Gordon Ramsey, you know that the larger the menu, the more complicated the ability to maintain good quality becomes. Though this restaurant managed to keep a good level of quality, I could see how it could degrade without diligence. Overall, I would give it about 4 stars.
We stayed at the Embassy Suites in Williamsburg which I will say was definitely not the best Embassy Suites I have stayed in (and I have stayed in a LOT of them). It wasn't super clean, appeared a bit old, and breakfast was both terrible and chaotic. Still the service at the hotel was great and that saved a lot of the disappointment we felt at the accommodations.
Finally, we spent Labor Day in Colonial Williamsburg. We ended up upgrading our tickets to an annual pass because we weren't even able to see a fraction of it. The grounds were beautiful and so fun to walk around. We did a tour of the Governors Palace which was very well done by the staff there. Then we went to lunch at the Kings Arms near the Palace. Not a great restaurant, but was convenient and tried to stay true to what would have been the food of the time.
All in all we walked a lot, ate a lot, and spent quality time together as a family which was worth every penny. We definitely want to do the carriage ride and visit Yorktown on our next visit, but we were thankful for this mini break. If you are searching for a quick trip and live in the area, consider the Historic Triangle as a great place to learn about history and have a fun time with family and friends.
We will be back so the search continues....
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