Mt. Vernon and Fall Color

I had the pleasure of going to Mt. Vernon on Sunday. I've gone many times for work, but this was the first time I went as a tourist, and it was a great place to just visit.

My in-laws are in town for the Thanksgiving holiday and they wanted to go, so we packed everyone in the mini-van and off we went.

About a year ago, the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, which runs the estate, opened a new Visitors Center and a new Museum and Restaurant complex. Very nice. While the adults were given site maps, my son got a special children's discovery map.

There were some puzzles there and he really got into exploring the estate. There he is guiding his grandma and grandpa.

The thing that impressed me the most, was the stuff that George Washington did with farming and business. He was an environmentalist who used a 7 year rotation of crops to make sure that the nutrients in his farms were not depleted. He also instructed his slaves and workers to use fallen timber when possible. There was also a compost area for all of the human and animal waste. Once composted, this made for good fertilizer. Washington even left part of his land untouched. Did you know that there was a quarry on his property that provided cobblestones for the estate along with other stone for early federal buildings in D.C.?

At it's height, Washington's farmland totaled 8,000 acres. Today the estate covers only 500, but it's a beautiful part of the world. This is the view of the Potomac from the backside of the main house. I've been fortunate enough to see a sunrise from this vantage point and it is spectacular. Washington lived in this home for 45 years, and it was under renovation for 30 of those 45.

As beautiful as the place is itself, I could not get over the color in the trees. That's Philip, Helaine and Helaine's Mom and Dad. Sandy & Stan Weber visit us every Thanksgiving.

Here we are in mid November and there is still some great color in the leaves. It's been a weird fall, color wise that is. Perhaps it was the drought that was in full force at the beginning of autumn, or maybe it was the freakishly warm October. Whatever the reason, this has been a long a drawn out leaf season.

We also stopped to see the 16 sided barn. Washington came up with this design so that he could take horses and have them walk and grind up the wheat. The grain would fall through slats in the floor and there it would be cleaned and collected.

We may know him for the Revolutionary War and for the Presidency, but Washington was a true renaissance man and a trip to his home is still worth taking more than 200 years after his death.