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Yorktown Victory Centre (Virginia)
by catsholiday
Yorktown Victory Centre
This I another part of Virginia's Historic triangle which tells the story of the colony's beginning through to the Revolutionary War and Declaration of Independence.
As you arrive and before actually entering the museum there is a display in a circle of the flags from the thirteen colonies. The ... dates when they joined the union and a few facts are at the base of each flag. It look pretty impressive as you arrive at the centre
PRICES AND OPENING TIMES
Jamestown Settlement Yorktown Victory Center Combination Ticket American Heritage Annual Pass
Adults $16.00 $9.75 $20.50 $35.00
Ages 6-12 $7.50 $5.50 $10.25 $17.50
The Yorktown Victory Center is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily (until 6 p.m. June 15 through August 15). Closed Christmas and New Year's days.
WHERE WILL I FIND THIS?
Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown form "Virginia's Historic Triangle," all linked by the scenic Colonial Parkway, and are all very easily found as they are well signed off interstates 95 and 64 and U.S. Route 17. It is actually on Route 31 South, next to Historic-Jamestown, and they are all just ten minutes in a car away from Williamsburg. They are all very close together but you do need a car to get around and there are plenty of free car parks near each site.
ABOUT THE MUSEUM
This museum which tells the story of the whole American Revolution is situated next to the battlefield where allied American and French forces won the decisive battle of the American Revolution in 1781.The museum chronicles the entire story from colony unrest to the forming of the new nation.
GOING INSIDE
One of the most impressive displays in the museum is a copy of the American Declaration of Independence and then further displays to interpret the document and its significance to the USA and the world. It is cleverly done with the theme of choosing a path - either taking the side of the British, the Colonists or remaining neural with stories told by characters for each path. Along with this is a printing which is extremely rare of the Declaration. If you are interested in this broadsheet print then there is a video just about this.
For me the most moving section of the museum was the "Witnesses to Revolution Gallery" and in here they take ten people from different backgrounds whose lives became embroiled in the Revolution. We meet the people as life-size figures and then their individual stories were told through text and artifacts and even some spoken recordings and in this way these people and their stories are brought to life. I found this strangely moving; I don't know whether it was the stories or their bits and pieces of artifacts or just the entire thing but suffice to say a tear came to my eyes as I was in this area.
A film which is set in a mock up encampment the night before Yorktown was seized called ' A Time of Revolution, is shown in the museum every half hour'. In this, we meet different soldiers talking about their war and their hopes and fears. It is very well done and helps recreate the atmosphere especially for young people so they can connect with 'real' people as opposed to just abstract names.
"Yorktown's Sunken Fleet" looks at the many ships lot in the war and has displays of articles brought from wrecks sunk in the York River, especially from the British supply ship Betsy.
THERE IS MORE OUTSIDE TOO
Once through this modern and very well presented museum you can continue outside to see a recreated 'Continental Army encampment', where they have guides in costume who are great at using their knowledge and skills to act out as well as describe daily life of American soldiers at the end of the war. As I have said before the Americans are great at these recreated living museum type of displays and they are so good at helping children understand history in a fun way.
As well as the army encampment there is also a re-created 1780s farm. This has a house typical of the time and place in Virginia with an outside kitchen, tobacco barn, fields with crops like tobacco and corn the former was Virginia's main money making crop and the latter for food. A herb and veggie garden also shows what the colonist grew and used at the time. A short video tells of the importance of tobacco and how it was harvested and treated .We had a try combing cotton which is harder than it looks when done by an expert. We also learned about how the colonist used herbs in cooking, as an insect repellent, medicines and also as dyes for cloth.
Within the museum we were able to watch a number of mini films with actors playing Washington and Cornwallis and in each film, different topics were discussed and both men gave their viewpoints and philosophies. They gave their views on taxes at the time, what makes a good army commander, Independence, after the war and other topics. It was once again very well done and made an easy and interesting way to bring this period to life for visitors from our time.
IT IS GROWING BIGGER STILL
I thought the entire museum was excellent. I understand there is some expansion taking place and now there is going to be a new Yorktown Museum. I took this from the website as I have not been to this not yet completed part.
"The Yorktown Victory Center is embarking on a transformation with an imposing new facility - the façade linked to Yorktown area architecture - and a reconfigured site plan allowing for expanded, state-of-the-art gallery exhibits and enhanced outdoor interpretive programming. A new name - American Revolution Museum at Yorktown - will be implemented upon completion of the project in late 2016"
This will greatly enlarge the museum and increase the size as well as having many exhibits taking the interpretation of the Revolutionary War and the ways country changed and developed as it began its journey after Independence.
RECOMMENDED?
We spent a morning here and found plenty to interest us and we could have stayed longer but we only had a week in Virginia and there really was so much to see. If you are interested in American history then Virginia is the state to visit and the Historic triangle is a must see. This is one part of this triangle and you make your way around, the story of America takes shape; from the very first ships landing at Jamestown through to the Declaration of Independence after the revolutionary War. You can go even further and visit the sites of the Civil War nearby and this is exactly what we did.
Thanks for reading. This review may be posted on other sites under my same username.
©Catsholiday
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Jamestown Settlement (Virginia)
by catsholiday
Jamestown Settlement
Virginia
A few years ago we spent a week exploring the historic sites in Virginia and there are quite a few so it kept us pretty busy. We took my daughter and her partner and as my daughter loves American history she was in her element.
OPENING TIMES AND PRICES
Both the Jamestown ... Settlement and the Yorktown Victory Centerwhich is nearby are open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily (until 6 p.m. June 15 through August 15). Closed Christmas and New Year's days.
Prices taken from the website for 2013
Jamestown Settlement Yorktown Victory Center Combination Ticket American Heritage Annual Pass
Adults $16.00 $9.75 $20.50 $35.00
Ages 6-12 $7.50 $5.50 $10.25 $17.50
HOW TO GET THERE
Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown form "Virginia's Historic Triangle," all linked by the scenic Colonial Parkway, and are easily reached via interstates 95 and 64 and U.S. Route 17.
WHAT IS THERE?
This is a recreation of the original Jamestown Settlement which was the first permanent settlement in America from England. They arrived thirteen years before the famous Pilgrim Fathers landed near Boston. This settlement was founded in 1607 and named after King JamesI. It is from this settlement that Pocahontas met her husband John Rolfe after saving the life of Captain John Smith and being captured by the settlers. She was a princess of the Powhatan tribe in this area.
This is an amazing place with almost life size replica boats, replica Powhatan village and colonial fort, films, displays and so much more. It is the kind of replica museums that America does so well.
We started off in the main building looking at the many exhibits and sat and watched the introductory film. The film tells the story of the Powhatan Indians and their culture before the arrival of the settlers. It then moves on to tell about the arrival of the various Europeans and indeed the ones from Africans who came as slaves to Virginia.
It was good to see that the journey and culture of the African slaves was not ignored. There was a large diorama with a full-scale dwelling and artifacts from the Ambundu culture of Angola. I was also impressed with the depiction of how the Africans first encountered the Europeans who were going to teal many of them away a slaves and how this affected their lives and culture as the transatlantic slave trade really gathered pace.
Virginia's tobacco-cultivation and how it relied on slavery is well documented and displayed. Using archeological finds they have re-created a slave quarter and a planter's house and Indian cabin within the museum site.
We then headed out into the main recreated areas of the museum and headed to the Powhatan village. There were reed covered homes called yi-hakans. We had a go at some Indian games, and you could walk all around the village and look into the yi-hakans or covered homes. There was also a ceremonial circle of carved posts like mini totem poles. This tribe was the one which Pocahontas came from and the village has been recreated from accounts written by the colonists and also on archaeological findings at a site once inhabited by Paspahegh Indians, the Powhatan tribal group closest to Jamestown.
Guides dressed in historical costumes will tell you about the Powhatan way of life and on the site they grow and prepare food, process animal hides, make tools and pottery, and weave natural fibers and visitors can also have a go at grinding corn, gardening or playing a game of corncob darts. I have to admit we only tried the first and last activities as gardening looked pretty hard work and not a lot different to gardening in my own garden.
There was a recreated fort similar to that they believe the colonists would have built. You could try on the metal armour which was a hoot - made us look totally ridiculous. All around the site were guide wearing costumes who would explain the scene as though they were of that time and showing you around. We were also shown how to fire a musket and what a palaver that was. We were better at the quoits and bowls and enjoyed challenging each other. Within the wooden fort palisade there are houses of wattle-and-daub and thatched roofs and a church as well.
There were replicas of all three ships that sailed from England to Virginia in 1607. The 'Susan Constant', 'Godspeed 'and' Discovery' .They seemed pretty small and uncomfortable and the idea of four-and-a-half-months at sea in any of them would have scared me to death. The 'Susan Constant' and the 'Godspeed' still sail in the area from time to time so they are not just pretend boats! The original 'Susan Constant', 'Godspeed' and 'Discovery' sailed from London on December 20, 1606, bound for Virginia.
The ships carried 105 passengers and 39 crew members; 71 on the 'Susan Constant', 52 aboard the 'Godspeed' and 21 aboard the 'Discovery' which was the smallest ship. I take my hat off to these brave souls who left in these tiny ships to go to a land that had nothing at all at the time except natural resources.
The Americans do these living replica museums brilliantly. They may not appeal to all and others question some historical facts but we find them excellent ways of learning about the history in an interesting and lively way. The guides in costume were well informed and played their parts well. You could take the information in easily or spend longer and really delve deeper into all the documents and authentic artifacts, it just depend s on how deep you want to go with your learning and how interested you are and also how much you can take in when making one visit.
We spent a long morning here prior to a late lunch so a few hours but you could spend longer and if we had had young children they the games and experiences could have taken a lot longer but as a group of adults we just had a quick go at the activities rather than spending ages perfecting our skills.
We had a fabulous time in Virginia exploring all the historic sites and this was an excellent way to learn about the first colony in America and find out about the real Pocahontas rather than the one who was in the Disney film who married a completely different man!
Thanks for reading. This review may be published on other sites under my same user name.
©Catsholiday
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Iceland National Museum
by catsholiday
Iceland National Museum
We spent a day exploring Reykjavik and this was one of the places we visited in the afternoon after our lovely lunch in Café Loki. It is quite walk able from mot places in the capital but I believe buses do go out that way and of course you could always take a taxi. It isn't terrifically well signed but ... as we managed to find it obviously it is possible to find.
It is a large modern, not terribly attractive building. I think it looks more like a factory personally but inside is well laid out and there I plenty to see which makes it worth a visit.
TIMES AND PRICES
Summer
May 1st - September 15th:
Daily 10-17
Winter
September 16th - April 30th:
Tuesday - Sunday 11-17. Closed on Mondays.
Adult: 1200 kr. which is about 7.00 UK pounds
Senior citizens (67+) and students: 600 kr.
Groups of 10+: 600 kr.
Children under 18, ICOM, FISOS: Free
Visa and Mastercard are both accepted
ACCESIBILTY AND OTHER PRACTICAL MATTERS
Most parts of the museum are easily accessible with automatic doors. There are folding prams for use of visitors with young children and wheelchairs as well if needed available from reception. There are lifts to the basement, where the cloakroom and toilets are situated, and there is also a lift between the floors of the exhibition room.
There are three toilets in the cloakroom below the entrance, one of them for disabled, and further toilets with door openers on the 2nd floor, one is suitable for disabled.
Information is available in Braille just ask at reception. There are audio guides in Icelandic, English, Danish, German, French, Swedish, Italian and Polish. Special audio guides for children are available in Icelandic and English.
The museum is all n no smoking but there Is an area outside the café where wall mounted cigarette receptacles are available and people can smoke there.
The café is on the ground floor not far from the reception area but as we didn't use this I won't comment on what is offered or prices.
The museum shop was neat and modern looking and sold a variety of locally produced goods and handicrafts ,a good selection of books, children´s toys ,most of which are replicas based on old toys were also sold but the price were pretty steep on the things we looked at.
THE MUSEUM DISPLAYS
There was such a lot to see that really you needed to visit more than once. I find it hard to take in too much information at one time so we tend to choose a few things that interest u and spend time there and leave the rest as otherwise I get 'information overload'.
We looked at the exhibitions that told the story of the Icelandic nation from the beginnings to the present day. Even that was actually too much to take it all in.
'Making of a Nation' - tells the story of the Icelandic people through 'about 2,000 objects, dating from the Settlement Age to the present, as well as about 1,000 photographs from the 20th century.'
The exhibition start with the ship in which medieval settlers crossed the ocean to the island mainly from Norway and takes the visitor through the years to the final exhibition which is the airport which is Iceland's gateway to the world today.
Although there were many older exhibits the ones that grabbed my attention were those of the twentieth century which were collected into decades and sadly I remembered a lot of the things from the sixties onwards but it was funny to see them in a museum.
Another interesting section was the time between 1400 and 1600 when the Dane ruled Iceland and the Danish King forced them to become Lutheran Christians but being pragmatic they took on board the religion and happily adapted this into their former pagan beliefs.
One of the museum's most important pieces and one of the oldest is a sitting bronze figure that some think is Thor while others wonder whether it is a sitting Christ. The human figure has been dated to around 1000 AD. The figure is holding an object which could either be Thor's hammer, but look remarkably similar to the Christian cross.
The museum's exhibits are collected and displayed in chronological order but then there are also obvious themes which include Work and Way of Life,, Homes and Settlement Patterns, Arts and Crafts and finally Social Culture and Language
There are quite a few multi media displays with interactive touch screens . These allow you to choose how much you want to learn about different things and we spent some time on a couple of these but as they were in Icelandic we didn't get a lot out of the wording! One of these interactive exhibitions was a telephone which allowed visitors to talk to people from the past which we watched some youngsters enjoying. There were also different videos on digital screens.
As I said there was a huge amount of information with so many exhibits that you really needed to visit a few times to get full value from the place. It was beautifully set out with a mixture of high tech and traditional exhibits or artifacts. The explanations were in Icelandic and English which was handy for us.
Once we reached the twentieth century there were a huge number of photographs which again were interesting but there I a limit to how much visual information you can take in so we looked at a few which grabbed out attention but as there were well over 600 it would take some time to do them justice but it was an impressive collection.
The main exhibition,' Reflections of a Century', takes you year by year through the century tracing the history of Iceland and its people . Every year I represented by about half a dozen photographs.
We were beginning to be a bit foot weary and as we find there is a limit to how much we can take in we spent about an hour and a half in the museum before we felt we had had enough and needed to get back to the hotel for a bit of a feet up before our trip to see the Northern Lights.
RECOMMENDED?
It is not a 'must see' place but if you are interested in finding out a bit more about Iceland and its history it is well worth a visit. It is well set out and there I plenty of variety so something will appeal to everyone I would think.
This is the cultural museum in Reykjavik but if you fancy something very different you can skip this and visit the Phallus museum see http://www.phallus.is/phallus/." The Icelandic Phallological Museum is probably the only museum in the world to contain a collection of phallic specimens belonging to all the various types of mammal found in a single country."
I just wish we had known about it sooner but sadly we didn't have time to visit while we were there!
Thanks for reading. This review may be posted on other sites under my same username.
©Catsholiday
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