Historic Site

Tag

A grey clapboard building with people standing out front

6 Things To Do in Lunenburg, Canada

Lunenburg is on the South Shore of Nova Scotia. It is a UNESCO maritime gem. It is worth a day trip if you’re in the area. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. You can enjoy the experiences of a bygone era. You can also savor some fabulous regional ice cream, among other delights. Located at the mouth of the LaHave River, it’s a National Historic District. It also won the Communities in Bloom most beautiful small town in Canada....

house porch the brick looks orange and shaped like octagon, looking north

Inside the Famous Mark Twain House in Hartford, Connecticut

The Mark Twain House in Hartford, Connecticut, is a strange and unique place, reflective of one of America’s most beloved and extraordinary people. Samuel L. Clemens, aka Mark Twain, was born in 1835 in Hannibal, Missouri when Halley’s Comet soared by overhead. Twain, though nearly as well traveled as the comet, spent much of his life in Hartford where his cherished Gothic Victorian house is open for tours. If you’re a fan of ornate Gothic architecture or American writing, visiting...

A white lighthouse sits amid pine street and rugged rocky coast next to the ocean

10 Unique Things About Acadia National Park

Acadia National Park is unique because of being one with the community, sections of it interspersed and overlapping small towns with deep coastal heritage. It’s a place to see if you like hiking, biking, climbing, swimming, camping, boating, fishing, or watching the sunrise. If the rugged coastal landscape, abundant forest, and natural scenery beside the ocean sound appealing, this may be the place for you. I visited Acadia at the tail end of a nearly two-year solo road trip that...

Two couples stand in front of a colorful cafe. potted plants in the front
A marshy green oasis filled with swampy waters, trees and bushes

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Sleepy Hollow

You’ve heard of Sleepy Hollow and the headless horseman, but do you know about the other Sleepy Hollow Cemetery? This one is in Concord, Massachusetts and there are so many famous authors buried there they named a section “Author’s Ridge.” As a taphophile, I had to visit. I recently visited Concord while traveling in my van on a two-year solo nomadic road trip, hiking, visiting historic sites, and staying in short-term rentals. I stopped at the homes and locations made...

A beige wood two-story house with nine windows and a door surround by green grass and bushes
The author stands gazing out at the edge of the pond next to green leafy trees

What to Know if You Visit Thoreau’s Walden Pond

Nearly half a million people from around the world visit Walden Pond yearly to see where Henry David Thoreau lived and penned “Walden,” and I recently joined them. Now a state park, the Walden Pond State Reservation area is an internationally famous National Historic Landmark and is considered the conservation movement’s birthplace. Today, many people use the area for swimming, hiking, boating, and fishing. In the two years, two months and two days Thoreau lived there from July 1845 to...

Monticello exterior with people walking up

11 Fun Things to do Near Madison, Virginia

There are so many fun things to do near Madison, Virginia; you may be surprised. When I recently stayed for a month, I was shocked at how places and activities on my ever-growing list of things to do kept expanding. It was astonishing since I’d never heard of the place before renting a little cottage there. But it ended up being an idyllic location in the Shenandoah Valley within just two hours of many premiere Virginia locations and attractions. Plus,...

Montpelier exterior four columns and red brick house in front of trees

Five Presidential Homes in Virginia You Can Visit

There are nine presidential homes in Virginia, and I visited several. The homes belonged to President George Washington (Mt. Vernon), Thomas Jefferson (Monticello and Poplar Forest), James Madison (Montpelier), and James Monroe (Highland). William Henry Harrison’s Berkeley Plantation and John Tyler’s Sherwood Forest Plantation are not open to the public. Less formally, there is also Theodore Roosevelt’s rural cabin (Pine Knot) and the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library and Museum. When I spent a month visiting the Commonwealth state, I didn’t...

Red brick Yorktown Sign with white letters

Journey through Time at Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown

In Virginia, they call Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown the “Historic Triangle” because these three iconic colonial towns are within a few miles of each other. If you mapped them, the space between them would form a triangle. This makes them a perfect couple-of-day adventure for anyone interested in American history. Even if you’re not already a history buff, you’re bound to leave with new insight and appreciation you never expected. I spent two days exploring Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown. History...