04 – Fort Belvoir, VA and Mount Vernon

June 29, 2017 – After the delayed departure from Chocowinity, we had an uneventful drive to Ft. Belvoir, VA.  This is an Army installation on the Potomac River about 8 miles south of Mount Vernon.  The campground was almost brand new and was great with concrete pads and full hookups.  Because of the delay for the RV repairs we couldn’t get three nights on the same site.  So, we ended up with two on our original site but then had to move to another site for the last night.  Not a big deal as we only had to move about 200 feet.  Here is a photo of us set up on the first site.

Here we are set up on the second site.  You can see the Potomac River thru the trees behind our site. 

Lots of wild life including this osprey on its nest.

As we had been on the road a week, the first order of business on Wednesday was laundry.  Pat headed off for the laundry facilities while I got us a rental car.  After lunch, we checked out the commissary and PX.  Both were brand new and huge.  The variety and quality of the produce was amazing and the equal of any regular grocery store.

For dinner, we drove into old town Alexandria and met my brother, Gary, for dinner at the Fish Market on King Street.  Excellent dinner.  We then walked down to the river side.  Here is a photo of the old torpedo factory.  From WW 1 thru WW 2, this plant made hundreds of torpedoes to equip our submarines.  Today it is an arts and crafts center.

Here is a photo of Pat and Gary on the docks.  The bridge behind them is where the I-95 loop around D.C. crosses the river.

After walking around for a while we rewarded ourselves with a stop at Pop’s Ice Cream Shop.  Lots of variety and lots of customers.

On Thursday morning, we moved to our new camp site and then headed over to George Washington’s home, Mount Vernon.  Been many years since we have been here and they now have a visitor’s center and museum.  Here is a photo of the house from the land (lawn) side.

This house was originally built by George’s father and was much smaller than it is now consisting of only the center section and one story tall.  It had a central hall and four rooms.  It passed from George’s father to his half-brother, Lawrence, and then to George.  To handle his growing family and visitors, two additional floors were added to the house.  Then the two wings were added.  In the above photo, the wing on the right was where George and Martha had their bedroom and George had his library.  Most of the rest of the house was bedrooms and parlors to accommodate visitors.  Here is another photo of the land side from a different angle.

Here is a close up view of the main door on the land side.  The house looks like it is built of carved stone block but at the time it was built George couldn't afford that type of construction so what it is is yellow pine wood planks carved to look like stone blocks and finished with heavy paint and sand.

Here is a photo of the front porch on the river side of the house.

And here is a photo of the house from the river side.  This is the view that most people associate with Mount Vernon.

Here is a view of the Potomac River from in front of the house.  This is an amazing location for a house with a spectacular view of the river and high enough that it gets a nice cooling breeze.

And here is Pat relaxing on the porch.

There were a lot of out buildings for the kitchen, servants, etc.  Here is a photo of the stables.

George was very interested in farming and did a lot of innovation to develop better farming methods.  One of the things he studied was composting of manure and other materials for crop fertilization and here is a photo of the dung repository that he had built for this purpose.

The family originally had a burial vault a little south of the house but it was inadequate and was the worse for wear as visitors would take souvenir chunks.  Here is what it looked like.

In his will, George specified that a new tomb should be built.  It was completed in 1831 and George, Martha and other family members were moved to it.  The two monuments on either side of the entrance are the burial places of two of George’s nephews that had inherited Mount Vernon after George died.

Tomorrow, Friday, we will be continuing our way north with our next stop at the US Military Academy at West Point, NY.  Pat has never been there and I was in high school the one time I was there, so it should be interesting.