Williamsburg

Well, didn't I feel like the most attentive parent when I wrote notes to the preschool two weeks in a row explaining that Graham would not only be picked up by someone else, but also dropped off by someone other than me?  LOL  At the most, we've snuck away just the two of us once a year.  Anyways, MORE awesome friends agreed to keep the boys for a couple of nights, so we could spend some quality time together :)

A couple of summers ago, we did a staycation in DC, and one of the things we loved most about it was we didn't waste much of our time with the actual travelling.  Josh mentioned the idea of Williamsburg, and that just sounded perfect!  It was pretty close, and there's tons to do!  We got Jackson on the bus and Graham dropped off at school as well as the boys' stuff down the street, and off we went!  After some caching and stopping for lunch along the way, we checked into our hotel and relaxed a bit before heading back out to explore William & Mary and Williamsburg.  For our first night, we ate at Berret's Taphouse in their patio area.  It was a beautiful night, and the food and drinks were perfect!  After dinner we wandered around Duke of Gloucester Street, which is full of shops, restaurants and historical buildings.

Standing next to the answer to a geocache.  You can hear water rushing under this metal covering.

Still has such a strong imagination... ;)

We walked around William and Mary for a cache or two earning our dessert at Retro's Good Eats!

We enjoyed sleeping in and not having a true schedule!  Ahhh...!!!  We got ourselves ready, and it was lunch time already!  Based on many recommendations, we headed to The Cheese Shop, again on Duke of Gloucester St. (DoG St.)  It was pretty crowded, but we snagged a seat outside and definitely enjoyed our yummy sandwiches!  The Colonial Parkway was our next destination.  

The drive really was beautiful!  We started in Yorktown at the Visitor Center to get a sense of what we wanted to see.

The water was a beautiful shade of blue.

This cave was part of finding a geocache.  Josh and I love completing Earth Caches because you get to learn about something you probably never would have seen otherwise.  In this instance, these caves are where some British troops hid (unsuccessfully) while under siege from the colonial army at the end of the war.

We wandered along a beach enjoying the fresh air and scenery.

We drove back down The Colonial Parkway to Williamsburg to walk around.  We parked the car and walked along a very pleasant walkway to the actual historical area.  We didn't go into anywhere specific, but we enjoyed just walking around checking out the historical buildings.  After getting our fill on history, we ate an early dinner at Green Leafe Cafe before doing some more wandering around William and Mary.  The first night's wandering was in the dark, so it was definitely more to look at this time!

A little fun with Halloween decorations on DoG St.!  We headed to the same ice cream shop for dessert to round out our day :)

Did a little hiking and caching on the way home to pick up our Buddy Bears!  We had SUCH a fun time, and again thoroughly enjoyed the fact that our getaway time wasn't spent driving somewhere.  We are really lucky to have such wonderful destinations so close to our home!