Plimouth Plantation is Better than Walmart

This day requires two posts....here's the first...

On Tuesday we went to Plimouth Plantation, the amazingly authentic re-creation of the 1627 village where the Pilgrims settled. If you haven't seen this, it's a "living museum" where everything is exactly as it was 380 years ago. The structures, the costumes, the tools, the food, and the people are all as they were.
The people are modeled after real people who came over on the Mayflower, so they tell of their lives in the language they used. You can interact with them but they never come out of character, so you can ask them about their experiences and their lives...it's an amazing technique that makes history so understandable and interesting.

Peter actually tried to get this guy to come out of character by asking him where he really lives when he is not working here. The guy said, "Where else could I live? Out there? In the wilderness?"

Everything, I mean everything they say and do is in character. After a while you feel like you are actually living in 1627. He talked about the clothes they wear, that they brought them over with them from England and they are no particular size...he said "it's not that we can't make our own clothing, we are very skilled at that in our homeland but we just don't have the time because we have so much to do to survive here in this new land, and we have the women and children to protect from the natives." I finally had to drag Peter away from this guy since he was hell-bent on getting him to break character.

There are also present-day crafstman who produce the utensils, pottery and furnishings for the village using the techniques and tools that were used in the 17th century. While they worked they answered questions and talked about what they were doing.

Here is a potter...and a carpenter.

If you are ever looking for a place to go on vacation I highly recommend Plymouth and Plimouth Plantation. It's a great place to take the kids too. I have no jokes about this place...it was simply amazing and way better than Walmart!