DC Trip Day 4, Sunday

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Sunday marked a new chapter after another 2hr drive back to Charlottesville we rushed to see Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson.  

His home was gorgeous and regrettably another place where pictures are only allowed outside. Inside you walk first into this room with artifacts from the Lewis and Clark exhibition, and then you walk into his large library that connects to his bedroom.  His bedroom is where he died on July 4^th.  What I loved about the house was that he designed and had it built.  The ceilings were large and the beds were built into the walls.  He had clocks, doors and windows that worked on a pulley system, and all sorts of different features you do not normally see in a house from that time.   

tunnel under house

The house is built on a hill and he took advantage of that to build the slave quarters, food storage, and stables under the house as a basement.  We went to the graveyard and saw his family plot, sadly he outlived all of but one of his 6 children and most of his grandchildren.  

Jefferson Tomb

 He also died in tons of debt from reckless spending so his daughter had to sell everything after he died.  He had tons of servants that he sold except for the Hemming children which DNA has proved were his kids with Sally Hemming a slave.  It was so interesting. 

Gardens

After settling in our hotel in Charlottesville called the Omni, and paying 30 for a taxi ride to get here, we were pleasantly surprised.  The hotel is extremely nice and we even have robes to wear.  There is a street of shops and restaurants behind the hotel that were nice to walk down.  We ate pizza from real Italians.  The pizza was prosciutto and goat cheese, which was really good.   

Pizza

The pizza has pesto, mozzarella and goat cheese, tomatoes and prosciutto on top.  After it got dark outside, we went on a ghost walk.  In older cities tour guides take you on a walk of the town telling you ghost stories that happened in some of the homes.  For our tour we also relived the last hanging in Charlottesville.  In short, a prominent mayor was hanged after his wife was found murdered in the bathtub, the evidence we heard from the presentation made me at least believe that the mayor had part in her death but that it was not just him involved.  We then had gelato at Splendora’s even though it was freezing outside.  For the ghost walk and gelato one of John’s co-workers joined us.  I have never had gelato before so this was a real treat for me.  It is so creamy and soft.  I had four flavors: salted caramel, chocolate sorbet, white chocolate lemon, and raspberry.  My favorite was the salted caramel.  I actually did not like the chocolate sorbet because it was too dark, which meant that John loved it of course.  So Sunday was an easier day on our feet, still fun, better food, and less stressful than the rest of the week as been.