Williamsburg, Virginia (Multi-Day Tour)
This tour can be combined with Hampton Roads and Washington, DC travel packages
Tour package includes educational Step-On-Guides

As the incubator for ideas and concepts that would shape our nation, Williamsburg has a rich history to inspire our youth.  What better place to learn what it means to be an American than Colonial Williamsburg?   Capture their attention and imagination through study visits featuring events and experiences that take place at their eye level.  The local militia leader summons young people to formation.  Helping to polish silver at a middling family home offers interaction with historical interpreters as servants.  Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry field questions about their quest for freedom.  Blending historical facts with active participation, Williamsburg interpreters introduce buildings and other 18th century objects to engage and encourage the love of history and learning.

Williamsburg claims a long and fascinating history.  In its three centuries, Virginia’s former capital enjoyed both periods of great fortune and dramatic decline before reinventing itself through an unprecedented restoration process that began in the mid-1920s.  This successful effort of recreating Williamsburg’s past in a way it can be enjoyed in the present is what draws (and awes) vast numbers of students to these brick-paved streets.

BUSCH GARDENS EUROPE

Voted the ‘World’s Most Beautiful Theme Park,’ Busch Gardens Europe is a European-themed park bursting with adventure at every turn.  The park’s newest ride, Curse of DarKastle, sends students on a journey through a grand Bavarian castle frozen in time.  At Busch Gardens Europe, 17th century charm is combined with 21st century technology to create the ultimate adventure park experience.  Situated on 100-acres, Busch Gardens Europe boasts more than 50 rides and attractions, 10 main stage shows, a wide variety of award-winning cuisine and world class shops.  Just a hop, skip and a splash away is Water Country USA – the mid-Atlantic’s largest water play park.  Featuring a 1950s and 1960s surf theme, Water Country USA offers more than 30 slides, water rides and super soaking thrills.

COLONIAL WILLIAMSBURG

Colonial Williamsburg is the world’s leading living history museum – the restored 18th century capital of Britain’s largest, wealthiest and most populous outpost in the New World.  Here they interpret the origins of the idea of America, conceived decades before the American Revolution.  The Colonial Williamsburg story tells how diverse peoples, having different and sometimes conflicting ambitions, evolved into a society that valued liberty and equality.  Americans cherish these values as a birthright, even when their promise remains unfulfilled.

In Colonial Williamsburg’s 301-acre historic area stand some 500 restored, reconstructed and historically furnished public buildings, homes, stores and taverns.  Costumed interpreters tell the stories of the men and women of the 18th century city – black, white and Native American, slave, indentured and free – and the challenges they faced.  In this historic place, they help the future learn from the past.  Listen for the murmurings of revolution.  You’ll hear it everywhere – mingled with the day-to-day conversations of patriots, loyalists, tradespeople, politicians, merchants and servants.

Your admission pass entitles you to complete access to explore Colonial Williamsburg’s recreated and restored buildings, sites and exhibits.  Engage a working carpenter in a discussion about period house construction methods, stop in at the apothecary to learn about 18th century remedies, explore the Governor’s Palace and Gardens…at every turn, students will meet historical interpreters and character actors who will regale them with the expertise of scholars and the flair of performers.  Visit Colonial Williamsburg and step back more than 220 years to the eve of the American Revolution.  Additional highlights include the Capitol, DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Center, Bassett Hall and dinner at one of several historic taverns.

A visit to Colonial Williamsburg offers students a unique opportunity to embark on a revolutionary adventure.  Each day, their newest interactive program, Revolutionary City, invites you to discover something new about the challenging decisions and troublesome times that faced a town at the heart of America’s quest for independence.  Listen to the ringing words of the Declaration of Independence.  Experience life in a town occupied by British forces.  March with General Washington and his troops as they begin their journey toward Yorktown and victory.  Specific educational programs available upon request.

HAUNTINGS OF WILLIAMSBURG

Revisit the past in a whole new way with an exciting Hauntings of Williamsburg tour.  You will journey by candlelight through the streets of Colonial Williamsburg, listening to eerie tales of Williamsburg's only witch trial, Black Beard and his crew, the ‘Wagon of Death,’ which can still be heard bringing prisoners to the gallows, and accounts – told centuries apart – of ghostly parties at Raleigh Tavern.  Is that the wind whispering through the trees or have you become a witness to the ‘Hauntings of Williamsburg?’   Hear the eerie stories of George Washington, Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson.  Based on stories from Jackie Eileen Behrend's award winning book, ‘The Hauntings of Williamsburg, Yorktown and Jamestown.

HISTORIC JAMESTOWN ISLAND

Administered by the National Park Service, historic Jamestown Island, the original site of the Jamestown colony, offers a wealth of activities for exploring the first permanent English settlement in North America.  Founded in May 1607, some 13 years before the Pilgrims arrived at Plymouth, Jamestown served as the capital of Virginia throughout the 17th century and saw the establishment of the language, customs, laws and government practiced in our nation today.  At Jamestown Island, you can watch the unearthing of America's foundations as archaeologists excavate the recently discovered site of the 1607 James Fort.  See more than 1,000 artifacts at the Archaearium, an innovative exhibition facility that also includes interactive exhibit areas that interpret the rediscovery process of archaeology.  Join a park ranger to learn how Captain John Smith and others carved a settlement out of the Virginia wilderness or meet a character from Jamestown's past for an eyewitness account of the colony's difficult early years.  Overlooking the scenic James River, historic Jamestown Island also boasts the only remaining 17th century above ground structure – the church tower – and reconstructed 17th century Jamestown Memorial Church.  At the Glasshouse, costumed glassblowers demonstrate one of the first industries attempted in America using 17th century tools and techniques.  Exhibits, an introductory film and a museum store are also available at the new Visitor Information Center.

JAMESTOWN SETTLEMENT

At Jamestown Settlement, comprehensive gallery exhibits describe world events and social and economic conditions that led to the English colonization of American and the formation of the Virginia Company that sponsored Jamestown with a goal of earning its investors a profit.  Learn about the land and lifestyle of Algonquian speaking tribes in coastal Virginia under the powerful leader Powhatan and about the culture of the first documented Africans in Virginia.  Outdoor living history areas bring the 17th century to life.  The Indian Village demonstrates the Powhatan way of life from hunting, farming and fishing to housing, clothing and food.  At the museum pier, board the Susan Constant, Discovery and Godspeed, replicas of the three ships that transported the original Jamestown colonists to Virginia in 1607.  A riverfront discovery area provides information about European, Virginia Indian and African economic activities associated with water including navigation, boatbuilding, fishing, commodities and trade.  The recreated James Fort interprets the settlement during 1610-1614, reflecting its military and commercial character.  Wattle-and-daub structures with thatched roofs represent dwellings, work spaces and public buildings.

THOMAS JEFFERSON’S MONTICELLO

Monticello, located in Charlottesville, Virginia is the autobiographical masterpiece of Thomas Jefferson, designed and redesigned and built and rebuilt for more than 40 years.  Get an intimate look at the extraordinary house Thomas Jefferson built and furnished for himself and his family.  See the books, gadgets, art, furnishings and objects that reveal Jefferson’s unique mind.  Next, view the gardens at Monticello – a botanic showpiece, a source of food and an experimental laboratory of ornamental and useful plants from around the world.  The Monticello plantation of 5,000-acres was a center of agriculture and industry and was home not only to the Jefferson family but to workers, black and white, enslaved and free.  End your tour by visiting the grave of Thomas Jefferson where students can place a nickel, the coin which Jefferson adorns, on his tomb for luck.

YORKTOWN BATTLEFIELD AND VISITOR CENTER

See where American independence was won at the Yorktown Battlefield, a National Park Service site.  Today, Yorktown remains much as it was during the waning days of the Revolution.  Earthworks and siege lines mark positions of British and American Troops.  Cannons stand ready behind the embattlements and Surrender Field is a silent reminder of English General Cornwallis’ capitulation.  Explore the 18th century homes of Augustine Moore, where the terms of surrender were negotiated, and Thomas Nelson, Jr., a signer of the Declaration of Independence and commander of the Virginia militia.  Visit the Yorktown Victory Monument commissioned by the Continental Congress in 1781 and completed in 1884 to commemorate the victory at Yorktown.  See Cornwallis’ Cave where legend has it that the English General and his staff sought refuge from the bombardment by American and French Troops.  Other sites of interest include the Custom House built in 1720.

YORKTOWN VICTORY CENTER

Gain a new appreciation and understanding of our nation’s beginnings at the Yorktown Victory Center where America’s evolution from colonial status to nationhood is chronicled through a unique blend of timeline, thematic exhibits and outdoor living history areas that emphasize the experiences of ordinary people.  In an outdoor recreated Continental Army encampment, historical interpreters depict the daily life of a soldier.  A recreated 1780s farm provides a look at how many Americans lived in the early years of our nation.  Visit the crop field and tobacco barn and learn what crops were cultivated to provide an income.  Explore the house and separate kitchen for a glimpse of domestic life and try your hand at hoeing the garden or ‘breaking’ flax.  Indoor exhibition galleries recount the war’s effect on 10 ordinary men and women who witnessed the Revolution, highlight the roles of different nationalities in the Siege of Yorktown and explore the story of the Betsy and other British ships lost in the York River during the war.  Exhibits also describe experiences of ordinary soldiers, Yorktown’s importance as an 18th century port and the development of a new government with the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

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