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| ☑ Unit #191 |
Our original plan was to attend the Woodland Wildlife Sanctuary tour at 9:00AM, but we didn't see anyone when we arrived, so we opted to walk around the 7000-seat Filene Center instead. With the open air stage and lawn seating, it reminded us of
Ravinia in Illinois. How fun would it be to attend a show in a national park?!
In 1966, Catherine Filene Shouse (yes, the
Boston department store family) donated nearly 100 acres of her "Wolf Trap Farm" to the Department of the Interior, as well as the funds to build a large outdoor amphitheater. Her goal was to protect the land from encroaching roads and suburbs, as well as create a natural backdrop where the arts could be enjoyed in harmony with nature. The Filene Center opened in 1971, but was destroyed by a fire in 1982. Reconstruction of the venue was completed in 1984.
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| Leaves starting to change color by the Ovations Restaurant |
Then we proceeded to hike a portion of the Wolf Trap Trail...
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| Wolftrap Creek |
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| Great blue heron at Wolf Trap Farm Pond |
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| More hints of fall color |
On our way out, we stopped by the ranger station to get our first stamps from the Mid-Atlantic Region - yippee! Then we hopped onto the Dulles Toll Road for the short drive (with lots of road construction!) to our next destination via I-495N and the George Washington Memorial Parkway.
The
George Washington Memorial Parkway is actually an official unit of the National Park System. Established in 1930, in addition to calling for a scenic road, Congress protected a diverse array of sites along it as a "park and playground" near the nation's capital. Without an official visitor center, we headed to the Parkway Headquarters at
Turkey Run Park for the cache of passport stamps there.
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| Cue the angel chorus - I'm in stamp heaven! 😇 |
This was literally the best stamping station I've ever seen! Each drawer of the organizers in the photo has a unique stamp, and the dots indicate what ink color to use (blue for Mid-Atlantic or red for National Capital). They were even in alphabetical order!
And here's what R was doing to amuse himself while I was happily stamping away...
After collecting my 35 stamps 😍, we continued down the GWMP to Alexandria, VA. We stopped by the Ramsay House Visitor Center for another passport stamp and then walked along King St. through Old Town Alexandria looking for someplace to eat. We settled on
Andy's Pizza and gobbled down a couple of slices of New York-style pizza for a quick lunch because we still had one more stop for the day.
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| George, Martha, granddaughter Nelly, and grandson Washy |
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| "Moments of Truth" |
Then we went outside to check out the grounds and outbuildings of the estate while we waited for our 2:00PM tour of the mansion.
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| West front of the mansion from the bowling green |
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| Upper garden |
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| Men's slave quarters |
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| Fireplace in the men's slave quarters |
At 2:00PM, we got in line for the tour and were herded to the east front of the mansion, where we sat in the reproduction Windsor chairs on the piazza and enjoyed the view of the Potomac River and the Maryland shore until we could enter. Directly across the river is Piscataway Park, another NPS unit, which was established in 1961 to
preserve the viewshed from Mount Vernon from development.
The mansion is currently undergoing a revitalization project to install a new ventilation system and to make repairs to foundation walls and timber framing in the cellar, so some parts of the building were not accessible. Here are a few pics of the rooms we were able to see...
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| Front parlor |
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Harpsichord replica in the Little Parlor
The 1793 original is on display in the museum |
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| Dining room |
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| 2nd floor - Blue Room |
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| The Marquis de Lafayette stayed in this bedchamber |
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| 2nd floor - Chintz Room |
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| George Washington died in this room on December 14, 1799 |
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| Martha Washington used the small, Louis XVI-style writing desk in the corner |
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| George Washington's study and a replica of his "uncommon chair" (right) |
Then we exited the mansion and ended up in the kitchen, which was located in an adjacent building. Altogether we spent about 20 minutes on the tour.
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| Cupola - the original weather vane is in the museum |
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| East front |
After the tour, we continued to explore the grounds on the southern side of the estate, including the ice house and the family vault where the Washingtons were originally laid to rest after their deaths. A new tomb was constructed per the instructions in his will. In 1831, the remains of Washington and all of his family members buried in the Old Tomb were moved to the new structure.
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| Lower (kitchen) garden |
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| New Tomb |
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| George's marble sarcophagus is on the right |
A short distance away from the tomb is the Slave Memorial and Cemetery. In 1929, the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association (MVLA) erected a memorial to slaves buried at the estate. A more prominent memorial was dedicated in 1983. As an aside, I was pleased to see the inclusion of the historical context of
enslaved people at Mount Vernon throughout the site. George Washington's role as a slave owner was not glossed over nor sugar-coated.
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| The graves identified during the archaeological survey of the cemetery are outlined |
From the cemetery, we continued down the hill to the Potomac Wharf and the 16-sided barn at the Pioneer Farm site.
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| Looking north from the wharf |
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| Replica of the barn Washington built for treading wheat |
By this point, we had done a lot of walking all over the property, so we were thankful that the shuttle came by at just the right time to save us from having to trudge back up the hill. It dropped us off right next to the museum, where we spent about 45 minutes going through the exhibits. It was really interesting to learn about how the
Mount Vernon Ladies' Association saved a crumbling Mount Vernon more than 160 years ago, and how they are continuing the work to restore it to its 1799 appearance, including locating and acquiring original furnishings and other Washington objects.
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| Layers of a wall from the Chintz Room |
There were several original objects on display in the museum, including this clay bust of George Washington which was sculpted by Jean-Antoine Houdon in 1785 and was likely fired in the kitchen's bake oven.
His original "uncommon chair" is also in the museum. Washington bequeathed this chair to his personal physician Dr. James Craik, and at some point, Craik's descendants gave the chair to President Andrew Jackson. In 1905, the MVLA purchased the chair for $100, with $25 donated by Tennessee schoolchildren.
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| Washington (and Jackson) sat here |
After we finished going through the museum, we looked in the gift shop but didn't buy any merch. They had two smushed penny machines, but there was no way to load our own copper pennies (post-1982 pennies are mostly zinc and don't roll as nicely) and the cost was $1 each. Pass.
To avoid traffic, we decided to have an early dinner on site at the
Mount Vernon Inn Restaurant. The bacon jam burger was a juicy mess to eat, but really good! Before driving back to the hotel in Fairfax, we looked for a George Washington Memorial Parkway entrance sign since we were at its southern end, but no luck.
Our massive stamp haul today brings our totals up to...
Units: 46
Stamps: 122
Regions: 5
Here's where things get a little quirky - the GWMP Headquarters at Turkey Run had 35 stamps from multiple units/trails, but not all of them count towards the award. And because the location itself is in Virginia, the stamps for a unit like Theodore Roosevelt Island, which is actually in DC proper, are all considered Mid-Atlantic Region rather than National Capital, even though they're in red ink.
Not to worry, the stamps we get tomorrow in DC should put us over the top!
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| 70 miles, 2 hours |
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