Herb Society Meeting at Williamsburg, May, 2015, Part Two!

The Back Entrance of the Governor's Palace

Ballroom Gardens

A Very Shaded Walkway to the Terraces and Canal

The Box Gardens

The Terraces and Canal

Just Like England!

You Can Get Around the Palace Green in Style!

Chowning's Tavern!  Time for Lunch!

John Who Reads His Poetry for the Tavern Audiences

Our Merry Herb Lovers at Lunch!

Our Entertainment Included a Fiddle Player!

The Wetherburn Tavern Herbs

The Prentis House Pleasure Gardens

The Prentis House Kitchen Garden and Orchard

A Bird Bottle Ready for Nesting

Also wanted to mention we had an herb lover from New Orleans named Ann tag along with the group.  From the start, Bonnie and I decided that we wanted to concentrate on the gardens and not worry about seeing the insides of the buildings in Colonial Williamsburg.  So with that in mind, I'm still talking about the garden tour day and continuing down the Palace Green to the Governor's Palace.  While we saw the pleasure gardens, we missed what I was really wanting to see and that was the kitchen garden.  Sorry ladies!  You will get to see that in Part Three!

I jumped ahead with the Geddy kitchen garden in the previous post so now it is time to go in style in a horse and carriage for lunch.  We just walked it!  We ended up right at Chowning's Tavern and had a delicious and very entertaining lunch.  You don't have to have lunch reservations at any of the taverns that are serving lunch, but not all of them serve lunch every day.

We then went to Wetherburn's Tavern which is one of the original buildings in the Historic Area and the one of the most complete inventories of objects, furniture and even plants, from seeds and pits from fruits and vegetables that were found in the well.  Again, the gardens including herbs, flowers and vegetables was very utilitarian!

The Prentis House garden is one of pleasure, a small kitchen garden and orchard.  As I told the ladies one of the first laws as Williamsburg was being developed was that the residential areas all had to have a fence of wood to keep out livestock, including horses, cows, sheep, etc. and I think also to define property lines.  The commercial buildings, the college, the church, the palace and the capitol were all surrounded by brick walls.

There is more to see.  I'm going to try to get the rest posted today if I can.  Dark clouds overhead here.  Hope you are safe if storms are coming your way.  Talk to you later.