Linda A. Tancs's Blog: The Long and Short of It, page 27

A Geologic Wonder in Arizona

By Linda Tancs

A media darling, the geologic wonder known as Horseshoe Bend is a landmark feature of Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. It’s where the Colorado River created a horseshoe-shaped bend in Glen Canyon roughly 1,000 feet deep. The hike to the overlook is less than 2 miles round-trip over a hardened path; parking for the trailhead is in Page, Arizona.

Titanic in Tennessee

By Linda Tancs

Museums recounting the tragic sinking of Titanic abound across the world. Although the facility in Belfast is located in the actual shipyard, other venues are no less significant or poignant. For instance, Tennessee boasts Titanic Museum in Pigeon Forge, a half-scale replica of the ship. A deeply immersive experience, visitors enter the ship with a boarding pass bearing the name of an actual passenger or crew member. The heart of the ship is the Grand Staircase, constructed from the original Harland & Wolff plans with its oak carvings and cherub statue. Guests also experience what it was like to walk the hallways, parlors and cabins, surrounded by more than 400 artifacts directly from the ship and its passengers. The attraction is self-guided with an audio guide included in your purchase to enhance the tour.

Colonial Williamsburg

By Linda Tancs

Located in Williamsburg, Virginia, Colonial Williamsburg is the world’s largest living-history museum. The historic 301-acre campus includes 89 original buildings and more than 500 meticulous re-creations of lost structures as well as two world-class art museums under one roof. The former colonial capital features the reconstructed Raleigh Tavern, where patriot members of Virginia’s House of Burgesses met and cast votes during the Revolutionary era in defiance of the colony’s royal governors, whose palace is open for tours. Across the vast site you’ll find costumed, informative staff as well as the interpreting of colonial crafts like cabinetmaking, blacksmithing, silversmithing, spinning and weaving, barbering and wigmaking, and candlemaking.

Cherry Capital of the World

By Linda Tancs

Traverse City, Michigan, is known as the “Cherry Capital of the World.” That’s because the five counties around Traverse City make up the region that produces 40 percent of the annual tart cherry crop in the United States. It should come as no surprise that there’s an annual cherry festival to celebrate this bounty. This year’s festival, boasting rides, parades and lots of cherry-centric food, runs through July 6.

Plymouth Colony Comes to Life

By Linda Tancs

Plimoth Patuxet is a complex of living history museums in Plymouth, Massachusetts, recreating the original settlement of the Plymouth Colony established in the 17th century by the English colonists who became known as pilgrims. The site features timber-framed houses furnished with reproductions of the types of objects that the pilgrims owned, aromatic kitchen gardens, and livestock, together with actors in period clothing. The complex also features an interpretive homesite of the Patuxet (a Native American band of the Wampanoag tribal confederation) with a replica of a wetu (house) and demonstrations of cooking and canoe production.

Norway’s First Lighthouse

By Linda Tancs

Located on Norway’s southernmost mainland point, Lindesnes Lighthouse is the country’s first lighthouse. The first light occupying the site dates to 1656; the current cast-iron building dates to 1915. The lighthouse has been designated a national lighthouse museum and hosts various exhibitions relating to the development and history of lighthouses as well as maritime culture. Tours take place every day in July and last a little over one hour.

Seven Gables in Salem

By Linda Tancs

Named for its gables, The House of the Seven Gables is a 1668 colonial mansion in Salem, Massachusetts. Designated a National Historic Landmark District in 2007, The House of the Seven Gables is best known today as the setting of world-renowned American author Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 1851 novel. The seaside mansion was built for Captain John Turner I, the head of one of the most successful maritime families in the colonies. Built in the Jacobean/Post Medieval style, it’s one of the largest timber-framed mansions in North America still on its original foundation. In addition to the house and its grounds, the historic campus includes colonial revival gardens and several historic buildings.

War History at Lake George

By Linda Tancs

In Lake George, New York, you can step back in time at Fort William Henry and experience life at a British fort in 1755 during the French and Indian War, a conflict that many describe as the original first world war. Named for two royal grandsons, the fort was erected to protect the British colonies against French incursions in the region. Among the many activities at the fort, you can watch live musket and cannon firings, play 18th-century games and join the King’s Army! 

A Troll Hunt in Maine

By Linda Tancs

Boasting nearly a mile of tidewater shoreline, Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens in Boothbay is New England’s largest botanical garden. You’ll find more than 300 acres of gardens and natural spaces featuring both ornamental and themed gardens like a children’s garden and sensory gardens. But the scene stealers may very well be the giant trolls found throughout the native, natural wooded areas. Designed by a Danish artist, they’re composed of recycled wood and other materials like oak bark and tree roots. It’s about a 3-mile hike to see all five trolls, which tower above the forest at about 20 feet.

A Light of the First Order

By Linda Tancs

Located on the North Carolina coast between Cape Henry and Bodie Island lighthouses in Corolla is Currituck Beach Lighthouse. It bears the distinction of being one of the only lighthouses in America that still houses its original first-order Fresnel lens, which continues to flash today at 20-second intervals. The beacon, which can be seen for 18 nautical miles, comes on at dusk and ceases at dawn. It’s also the last brick and mortar lighthouse built in the state. Don’t miss the climb to the top, where you’ll be greeted with expansive views of the Currituck Sound, the Atlantic Ocean and the northern Outer Banks.