Mount Vernon

Em standing at the entrance to the plantation.

George Washington's mansion house on Mount Vernon.

George Washington inhereted the plantation from Lawrence Washington, his half-brother. He did a lot of work on the land, farms and house. It was expanded twice and has an impressive interior.

We thought it was interesting how they built the house. They used a process called "rustification" to make local pine wood look like stone. They grooved the wood and put three coats of paint with sand thrown onto it. The result is remarkable. It really does look like stone. They also painted the pine wood on the inside of the mansion to look like mahogany.

The house sits right on the Potomac river. Here we are at the wharf just a short walk from the house.

Nick standing in the upper garden.

This garden was used for distinguished guests to take walks and enjoy nature. It made me think of movies like Pride and Prejudice where they take strolls through the 'gawden'! There were boxwood parterres with a Frinch fleur-de-lis design. It was a beautiful garden! Washington also had a lower garden where fruits and vegetables were cultivated to use in the kitchen.

Next to the upper garden was an amazing greenhouse. George Washington was an excellent farmer and was very interested in plants. Here he built a greenhouse where he kept palm trees, lime trees and experimented with grafting and growing interesting plants.

One thing I thought was interesting about this building was that it had heated floors. There was a furnace room in the back where they would build fires and pump air through tunnels built underneath the building to heat the floor. Pretty remarkable for those days!