Last Week Together

Yes, that is right. Chad and I have spent our last week together for a while :( . He was offered a supervisor job at a pool back in Canada for the summer/fall and with Niblet on the way and him unable to work in the States and me unlikely to get hired in Canada we decided that he would go and work up there and I would stay in Virginia in an effort to save some money before the stork delivers. Our plan is that Chad will come back and get me the end of July which means 8 weeks apart or 56 days or 1344 hours or 80640 minutes... but whose counting? Oh right! That would be me!

So, knowing that this would likely be the last time we had to do some sight seeing around here (you know the stuff you say you will always go see- seeing as you live right near it, but never actually make it to...) we made the most of it.

This spring Liberty University built a giant Logo ('LU' out of rocks and shrubs) on Liberty mountain. They put a gazebo up there and we heard you could hike up there. We decided it would be the perfect place for a picnic lunch.

When we got to the road leading up to it, the gate was open so after we hummed and hawwed over if we were allowed to drive up the gravel road (there were no signs to tell us otherwise) we decided to go for it. We were glad we drove as it was a bit of long ways and it was hot (just like every other single day now!)

At the top was a spectacular view of Lynchburg and the University- everything is sooooo green right now! While we were up there, Dr. Falwell's wife and son came up, so we got a picture (taken by Macel Falwell) with Jonathan Falwell, who has officially taken over his late father's church.


A few days later we visited 'Point of Honor' which is an old historic site right in a Lynchburg neighborhood. It was George Cabell's Mansion- built in 1815. This was cool as it had a whole tonne of local history and was beautifully restored.
The next site to knock off the list was the Old City Cemetery- founded in 1806 making it one of the oldest public cemeteries in the US that has been in continuous use since it's founding (yes, I have the brochure in front of me as the resident historian has left the country!). More than 20,000 people (3/4 African American, 1/3 children under 4 years old) are buried there- from prominent leaders, to slaves, to war veterans.

Below- Where over 2,200 Confederate soldiers from the Civil war were buried.
As you walk through the Cemetery, there were a whole bunch of stuff to see- Hearse House and Caretaker's Museum, Antique Roses, Station House Museum, Chapel and Columbarium, Site of the Civil War Quatermaster's Glanders Stable.

Below- The Pest House Medical Museum where in the 1800's patients with contagious diseases such as smallpox or measles were quarantined, and then it was used in the civil war to quarantine Confederate Soldiers. (The sand on the floor was to absorb blood and fluids and odors!!!) I could NOT imagine what it was like to be a nurse in those times!

Above-Karmyn with some of the antique roses (25 weeks along).
Below- There was also a Butterfly Garden which was a quiet shaded pond with a giant weeping willow tree that was beautiful. However, we didn't see a single butterfly- just lots of frogs!!

Next up is Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest which was designed by Jefferson himself and built in 1806 as his personal retreat. It was built on a huge tobacco plantation. The house is an octagon with a wing off the one side (currently being re-constructed) that was the kitchen, smoke house, cook's residence. It is all currently being restored as it was private property up until 1984 and had been changed so much from how it originally was designed and built. It was neat to see the restoration taking place.

The funny thing about this site was that it was really pricey to get it ($9/person) and our tour guide was the world's worst. He would tell us one thing and the signs would say something different. He would bounce around from detail to detail and never really tie anything together. He just kind of mumbled his way through everything and afterwards, one of the other visitors who had been there before, told us more about the history in a 5 minute casual visit than our tour guide was able to communicate! Ha!


Below- Even the biffy was octagonal (and hid by this privacy hill that was actually where the garbage was buried!)
That was about all the sites we could squeeze in between errands, work, and packing... but there is always time for one last Golden Corral feast!!! This is a $7 Southern Buffet- all you can eat steak, ribs, BBQ, stew, salad, pizza, soup, bread, vegetable, potatoes, dessert, ice cream! And for that price you HAVE to eat until you feel sick, right?!?