OUR SURPRISE ASSIGNMENT sent us to Richmond, which is considerably deeper into Virginia than I had ever gone.
Richmond was the capital of the Confederacy, undeniably intriguing, but I had the missus to please and I figured Juju might relate more readily to 18th Century America than to the War Between the States. For one thing, those early settlers probably had cooler antiques. So we rented a car and drove directly to Colonial Williamsburg.
We looked around for a hotel close to everything, which means where the boutiques are. “I’m a shopaholic,” Juju admits.
At the imposing Williamsburg Inn, which by its very haughty English Regency presence seems to announce “Gentry Only,” the nice people at the front desk assured us that shops and all the other historical attractions were just a few steps away. We learned that a room in a separate annex would cost “only” $199.
The Williamsburg Inn annex turned out to be a white brick and thoroughly modern building. It was well-hidden, so as not to disturb the air of Colonial authenticity evident everywhere else. Otherwise, in keeping with tradition, the room had been furnished in a period sort of way, and our terrace allowed a view of a garden.
After a cursory look at Colonial Williamsburg’s charming old buildings, horse-drawn carriages, musket demonstrations and a bit of shopping, it was time for dinner.
We stepped onto the porch of Chowning’s Tavern, where a hostess wearing a bonnet and floor-length dress told us-in an Eastern European accent-that we would have a 20-minute wait.
A walk across Duke of Gloucester Street took us to the guardhouse, where soldiers in Colonial costume were teaching some tourists how to march. “Ewww, don’t we have enough war?” Juju said.
Back at the tavern, we sat down at a wooden table lit by candles. Our waiter wore breeches and a doublet and could play a mean set of bones (“It gets boring here at night,” he explained), but the food could have passed for 21st Century sports-bar fare-fried chicken with a dipping sauce, cheese spread, etc.
There wasn’t much else going on by the time we left Chowning’s, so we made plans for the next day: a walk around town until early afternoon, a visit to nearby Busch Gardens amusement park, and then on to Virginia Beach and the Atlantic Ocean.
Superficial, yes, but after studying the map, I had plotted out our ultimate goal.
The next day, we explored the grounds of the governor’s mansion and watched a baker making cakes in the kitchen, which stands apart from the main house. Somebody asked the baker where his sugar came from. “The Caribbean,” he said. “[It] was producing by far the majority of the world’s sugar at this point in time [pre-Revolution]. The island of Jamaica made more money for the English empire than all 13 North American colonies put together.”
Of course, we spent a fair amount of our morning in the stores, one of which, Mr. Greenhow’s, was filled with Colonial necessities, including the highly practical bird bottle.
“We attach the bird bottle to the house, not a tree,” explained the bonnet-wearing woman behind the counter. The brown earthen bottle had holes in the bottom for hooks. A little straw made it a fine sanctuary for a bird or two. “They keep away the mosquitoes, flies and other insects, because we have no screens, you see,” the woman said.
Juju bought one, even though we do have screens.
At an outdoor market, she purchased a little basket for $5, but the bill came to a bit more than that. “You mean they charged sales tax in Colonial days?” she said. The young clerk in white blouse peered at her through the blue-tinted lenses of his antique shades.
“In Colonial days, there would have been a tax also,” he informed her. “That’s why we revolted from the Crown.”
After awhile, Juju announced, “I’m about Colonialed out.”
SO WE MOVED ON to Busch Gardens. I hadn’t realized it was pretty much like most other theme parks, only with abundant trees and hills and constant reminders that Anheuser-Busch makes beer. On a stroll through ersatz European villages, we discovered an Irish pub with lots of Budweiser signs outside, but no mention of Guinness. How real is that?
In one oasis of authenticity, we came upon cages holding injured eagles and an ailing horned owl. A docent explained that the birds no longer could survive in the wild. The bald eagles looked just like the ones on Budweiser labels.
A few minutes later, we gazed down upon an area populated by gray wolves. Screams of roller-coaster riders, crying babies and a choo-choo whistle filled the air. The wolves ignored the noise, and I heard someone ask an attendant, “Are tourists part of their diet?”
We moved on to Virginia Beach but only for a quick look at the ocean and an overnight stay at the Sheraton. In the morning, Juju and I would take a drive that I saw as sort of a pilgrimage.
In my youth, I’d been crazy about horses. One of my favorite books was “Misty of Chincoteague” by Marguerite Henry, which is about a boy who found the perfect pony running in the wild herd that roams Chincoteague Island.
I figured we could visit Chincoteague and return to Richmond that night with time to spare. Starting out from Virginia Beach, this involved a 17-mile jaunt over causeways and through two tunnels that cross Chesapeake Bay. Then we had about 65 more miles of driving.
When we crossed the bridge onto Chincoteague, I felt gratified. This was real, not a reproduction: a picturesque little port filled with commercial fishing boats, neighborhoods of unpretentious houses, and mom-and-pop storefronts lining Main Street.
Our initial pony quest turned out to be easy, because the annual pony drive and auction had taken place just a week before. Mares and foals are held back from that traditional culling of the herd until the young ones are strong enough to function on their own. Meanwhile, mothers and offspring stay in a fenced compound.
Juju and I admired them for a while. Mothers calmly grazed while the colts tried to cadge sips of milk. They didn’t look feral at all.
So we set off to see the wild ones. A ranger at Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge said there were 150 ponies still on the island, but she hadn’t seen any lately. Somebody else said she had noticed some earlier in the day on one of the wildlife-refuge beaches.
When we got there, the beaches were filled with beachgoers. “No ponies here,” Juju observed. We then followed a 3-mile wildlife trail. After a while, we concluded, “No ponies here, either.”
Eventually, we gave up. But I had seen Chincoteague at last, a place I had loved as a kid but could only imagine. Of course, the local bookstore carried “Misty” and its many sequels. My old book was long gone, so I bought a replacement.
On the drive back to Richmond, Juju asked, “Well, did that fill a hole in your heart?”
I played the hard-bitten reporter and said, “No, but it makes the story better.”
Really, though, our visit had filled some kind of void in me. Memories of boyhood become dimmer every year and seldom return in such a fortuitous way.
Unfortunately for southbound shopaholics, by then all the roadside stands selling fireworks, cigarettes and Virginia hams were closed.
We were getting a little road-weary and goofy. At one point, my darling wife said, “Sometimes when I see those signs that say ‘no stopping,’ I think they say ‘no shopping,’ and I’m wondering, is this America, or what?”
– – –
THE DEAL
— TO RICHMOND (AIR ONLY)
— $319 FOR TWO: AMERICAN NON-STOP/ O’HARE, E-FARE FROM AA.COM
— OPTIONS: $406 (TWO-WEEK ADVANCE AIR)
