Hey y’all! I hope all is well with you and your loved ones during this crazy quarantine situation we’re in. I am getting restless and my family is beyond ready to get back out there and hit the road for our next adventure! I planned to share our Virginia road trip with you all shortly after we returned home, but I’ve been busy with teaching remotely, homeschooling my boys, and I’ve honestly just been sad and at a loss for words. It seems like it was forever ago that my travel bestie and I were planning our spring break road trip. I can’t believe that it was just last month that we were driving across the country on our longest road trip to date. Little did we know that the world would basically shut down as soon as we returned home. While I’m really sad this is happening, I am trying to soak up this time with my family and today Jake and I were talking about our favorite trips and our best travel memories. I thought, now is the perfect time to look back on this trip and share all the memories we made! As always, I hope this blog helps your family plan your next big adventure!

So, we were REALLY lucky that we were even able to take this road trip. We loaded up and left the day spring break started in early March. Carrie was able to use her father-in-law’s time share and we decided that we wanted to take the kids to Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia. We probably planned to visit too many places for one week, but we weren’t sure when we’d get back to the area and wanted to hit several states on this road trip. We decided to start our trip in Harpers Ferry, WV. Honestly, I don’t know if I was busy with school or what, but this is probably one trip that I knew the least about before leaving. Usually I spend several hours researching our destination and have a list of things I want to do and see. I feel like we did a lot of planning on the way, but what else did we have to do on a 20 hour drive? We didn’t know a lot about West Virginia, but it was a state that our kids had not been to yet, so we decided Harpers Ferry is where this trip would start. When I told my boys that it is one of the most haunted places in the US, they were all about it… until it got dark haha! The drive was really nice, we stopped after 6 hours and stayed the night in Memphis, TN. The next day was our longest drive of the trip, a total of 14 hours but we were finally on the East Coast! We actually stayed about 12 miles from Harpers Ferry in a town in Maryland (we got to mark another state off our list).

I will say that I was pleasantly surprised with Harpers Ferry. Like I mentioned, I didn’t really know much about this town until the drive and I am sure there is a lot that I can still learn about it. It is such a cute, quaint town. When we first arrived we weren’t really sure where to park and start the day. We drove through the town first and my excitement level sky-rocketed! I can be really nerdy when it comes to history and the town just looked so old. Then I saw a sign about Lewis & Clark and just knew it was going to be fantastic day! So, the parking in the town is very limited but signs guided us to large parking area about 1.5 miles from the town to Harpers Ferry National Historical Park. We had to pay to park, but there are facilities in that lot and a bus that picks up and drops off visitors. We decided to walk down to the town on the trails and that was an adventure in itself! The scenery was beautiful. Harpers Ferry sits right near the water and we really enjoyed the scenic walk to town. We saw waterfalls and climbed rocks and even stopped by old, creepy ruins on the walk into the town. Luckily it was all downhill and we grabbed the bus back to the parking lot when the day was over!

The town itself was like something out of the 1800s. Not a lot has changed and I think that is how the locals want it. I can’t keep saying this enough… I wish I would’ve paid attention in my history classes when I was younger. I still can’t believe that I walked in places that Lewis & Clark have been, where Thomas Jefferson has been, and where a Civil War battle took place. The buildings still have that old feel and the windows are adorned with relics from the 1800s. The candy shop still makes and sells candy from different time periods and we loved the first candy canes from the 1600s. It was also pretty creepy when most of my photos had auras and the kids were freaked out – I loved it hah! And, Thomas Jefferson is still Jett’s favorite president and we hiked up to Jefferson Rock and got to see where he stood on October 25, 1783! The views were impressive and we all thought this was the perfect day trip!

This was just our first stop on this road trip! Stay tuned to see our time spent in Washington DC, our White House visit, and our day trips to Colonial Williamsburg, Jamestown, and Yorktown.

Stay healthy out there!!