The family all loaded up and drove the roughly equidistant drive to Virginia, with Rick coming from Boston, the folks coming from Chicago, Christine coming from Wisconsin, and us of course coming up from Florida. When we arrived at the property in the middle of the night, it was a back country road that led us up to the front door. The property was outstanding. Three stories with bedrooms mostly on the ground floor, the kitchen and living room areas on the middle floor with the balconies and decks overlooking the lake, and finally the master suite on the top floor with the master bathroom and its only set of balconies.
Within a couple days, everyone had finally arrived and the Reunion could get started. Of course the boys got to see all of their cousins for the first time in nearly a year and they were ecstatic. The kids are all a year older so there was so much more interaction with all of them. The boys had the option of sleeping with their cousins on a different level than Mom and Dad this year (in the kid's bunk room), and they took advantage a couple nights, but never spent a full night down there before typically making their way upstairs.
We had to make good use of the property so this year we decided to hold a family Olympics one of the days we were all together. We setup games of all kinds. Everything from water balloon and Frisbee toss to full out volleyball, football, and basketball. Christine brought a couple kayaks with her and there were three kayaks for kids already at the property and they all got a lot of use throughout the trip. On one of he morning kayak runs, Antoinette and I were able to see a bald eagle about 50 feet in front of us in a tree. Always a pretty cool sight to see. We were even able to squeeze in a little fishing down off the dock on one of the rainy days since the boathouse was covered. Didn't catch anything, but we weren't really trying anyway. Just throwing some casts and talking.
Luckily for us the weather held up for the entire trip and we only had a single day of real heavy rain, but without all of the family there yet, we were really holed up that day in the property anyway, so it didn't really turn out to be much of an issue. There were plenty of minor injuries for the kids and to be honest, Billy is still recovering from whacking his head off a pool table while roughhousing with his cousins (he dove at one of his cousins who quickly sidestepped him leaving Billy to face plant into the hard table.
Anyway, enough about the property for right now. Time to talk about the two excursions we planned on this trip. The first excursion was to the US Marine Corp Museum about 45 minutes outside of Washington DC. This place was incredibly moving and a great experience for anyone that hasn't been there before. The museum is broken into zones and each zone takes you through the history the Marine Corp through various eras and wars. Each exhibit is filled with re-enactments, weapons and uniforms from the eras, and so incredibly filled with history it is hard to take it all in. It has every step of the Marine Corp from the original battles in Tripoli all the way up to a modern 9/11 Memorial.
With everything in that museum, it is really hard to pick out a single exhibit that was better than the rest, so I'll give you three of them. First, there was a re-enactment exhibit. You get into a helicopter that never leaves the ground of course, but you hear the radio and feel the vibrations from the rotors as if you're in it, then they tell you to leave the helicopter and enter the battle and when you walk out of the back of it, you are immersed in a miniature battlefield complete with blue morning skies, explosions going off, sounds of gunfire, and mortars going off all around you. All the while, a man is narrating the experience since this was a real story about something that really happened to a soldier in battle to try and show you what it was like. Outstanding.
Another was of course the 9/11 Memorial, complete with twisted pieces of steel you could touch, timelines you could walk the length of with pictures and story boards, and also included a photo exhibit outside of the museum, as well. Extremely moving and probably the most moving exhibit in the entire place.
And finally, likely the best exhibit there, was the flag from Iwo Jima. The actual flag that was flown in the famous photo at the top of that mountain, which also went on to inspire the shape of the museum itself is mounted in glass with monitors making sure there is no flash photography that might damage the flag. Surrounding that exhibit are the stars from all of the soldiers that died in that fight, again, an extremely moving experience. Overall, an outstanding excursion.
The other trip we took, which was the location of this year's family picture, was Monticello, the original home of Thomas Jefferson, and the building on the back of the Nickel and on some of the $2 bills. Jefferson's home is on the top of a mountain at the center of what used to be a plantation of some 10,000 acres. The home fell into disarray about a hundred years ago, but has since been restored to its former condition, as well as a museum that was also added on the grounds. We were able to take a tour of the grounds and the building itself, and then topped it all off by taking our family photo on the front porch of Jefferson's home and a piece of American history.
Overall, this was another successful Family Reunion. We got the family together from all over the country again, were able to celebrate some birthdays together (including Dad's 65th), got amazing weather, were able to see a little history, and to do it all as a group. The boys had a great time and I know they look forward to the chance to spend time with their cousins every year. Until next year, location YTBD. Stay tuned. Video will be coming soon.
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