A Trip To Virginia ~ Part 3

A cheery hello to you all. 

This is the concluding post in the Virginia trip series. 

On the downcast, cold and rainy morning of Tuesday, May 23rd, we met the group outside a church which was located right next to the small battlefield of Port Republic. The old battlefield was up on a hill that had a beautiful overlook.

 

Here's a plaque commemorating the battle that was fought here. It reads: 

Port Republic Battlefield

Here, June 9, 1862, Gen. T.J. "Stonewall" Jackson defeated Gen. J. Shield's vanguard advancing from Elkton under Gen. R.O. Tyler.  Federals engaged: 4,500

Killed, wounded, and missing: 551. Captured: 450

Confederates engaged: 6,000. Killed and wounded: 804. 

After spending a little time listening to the history of this battle, some families chose to visit the Shenandoah Heritage Market for lunch. It's made up of lots of little stores such as the Antique Barn, Country Canner, Crossroads Country Store, Grandma's Pantry, Hungry Farmer Country Cafe, Sew Classic Fabrics, Kitchen Kupboard, a little Amish furniture store, and more. 

The next stop was the New Market Battlefield and Museum. We were able to explore the museum a little more before heading outside to gather with the group. In order to make all the information about the battle in the Field of Lost Shoes come alive, the group had a reenactment. Everyone who wanted to participated received a wooden gun. We girls were on the Union side and were largely outnumbered by the Confederate troops. Needless to say, they won, but we all still had fun. :)  After the reenactment, the group followed Mr. Potter over to a small trail that led to an overlook of a spectacular view.

To end the day, part of the group met at a Presbyterian church and listened to David Cox give a fascinating, verbal biography about Robert E. Lee.

Wednesday, May 24th. 

This particular morning, the Frontier Culture Museum was the first thing on the agenda to visit. Since we had a little extra time to spare, we stopped at the Cyrus McCormick farm on the way. It is called Walnut Grove and is where Cyrus Hall McCormick invented and demonstrated the first successful reaper in 1831. His invention introduced the era of farm mechanization. 

I realized after looking through the pictures that we didn't even have a picture of the farm! So here's one I found online that accurately describes what we saw. 

 There were two friendly geese and one duck that came right up to Deborah when she offered them some food. While my parents, Sarah, Lauren and I were looking around inside the mill and shop, Deborah was outside picking up the goose and duck!

 

The Frontier Culture Museum is an outside museum with four different settlements that show how the people who migrated to America in the 1600s and 1700s lived. The immigrants came from England, Germany, Ireland, and West Africa. If you click on their link, you'll be able to read more about each of the settlements.

 

 This wood lathe was in the German house.

 Also at the German farm, there was a pig named Sunshine (above picture) who weighed 450 pounds. Now that was some pig!

 Here's another one of the settlements. 

After leaving the museum, we headed to Polyface Farms where the group enjoyed a nice lunch of homemade hotdogs. The owner, Joel Salatin, then gave us all a hayride around the farm and talked about each part of the production.They raise their own rabbits, turkeys, hens, cows, pigs, chickens, and lumber. You can read more about their production here
. They also have a little store where visitors can purchase books by Joel Salatin, (such as this one:

The Marvelous Pigness of Pigs)

 shirts, fresh eggs and dairy products, books, homemade apple cider, and more.

Mr. Potter invited the group to his house for a BBQ dinner after we finished up at Polyface Farms. We had an enjoyable time fellowshipping with the other families, holding the babies, and playing games. It was a good ending to our family trip, and I'm so thankful we were able to visit the Shenandoah Valley.
  
Shew me thy ways, O Lord; teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth, and teach me: for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day. ~ Psalm 25:4-5 ~