American Adventures: A Second Trip 'Abroad at home'Street, Julian
General
American Adventures: A Second Trip 'Abroad at home'
Street, Julian
Southern States -- Description and travel; Southern States -- Social life and customs
And yet the modernness on which Norfolk so evidently prides herself is
not something to be lightly valued. Fine schools, fine churches and
miles of pleasant, recently built homes are things for any American city
to rejoice in. Therefore Norfolk rejoices in Ghent, her chief modern
residence district, which is penetrated by arms of the Elizabeth River,
so that many of the houses in this part of the city look out upon pretty
lagoons, dotted over with all manner of pleasure craft. Less than twenty
years ago, the whole of what is now Ghent was a farm, and there are
other suburban settlements, such as Edgewater, Larchmont, Winona and
Lochhaven, out in the direction of Hampton Roads, which have grown up in
the last six or eight years. The Country Club of Norfolk, with a very
pleasing club-house on the water, and an eighteen-hole golf course, is
at Lochhaven, and the new naval base is, I believe, to be located
somewhat farther out, on the site of the Jamestown Exposition.
Norfolk is well provided with nearby seaside recreation places, of which
probably the most attractive is Virginia Beach, facing the ocean. Ocean
View, so called, is on Chesapeake Bay, and there are summer cottage
colonies at Willoughby Spit and Cape Henry. On the bay side of Cape
Henry is Lynnhaven Inlet connecting Lynnhaven Bay and River with
Chesapeake Bay. From Lynnhaven Bay come the famous oysters of that name,
now to be had in most of the large cities of the East, but which seemed
to me to taste a little better at the Virginia Club, in Norfolk, than
oysters ever tasted anywhere. Perhaps that was because they were real
Lynnhavens, just as the Virginia Club's Smithfield ham is real
Smithfield ham from the little town of Smithfield, Virginia, a few miles
distant. On the bank of the Lynnhaven River is situated the Old Donation
farm with a ruined church, and an ancient dwelling house which was used
as the first courthouse in Princess Anne County; and not far distant
from this place is Witch Duck Point, where Grace Sherwood, after having
been three times tried, and finally convicted as a witch, was thrown
into the river.
The several waterside places I have mentioned are more or less local in
character, but there is nothing local about Fortress Monroe, on Old
Point Comfort, just across Hampton Roads, which has for many years been
one of the most beautiful and highly individualized idling places on the
Atlantic Coast.
The old moated fortress, the interior of which is more like some lovely
garden of the last century than a military post, remains an important
coast artillery station, and is a no less lovely spot now than when our
grandparents went there on their wedding journeys, stopping at the old
Hygiea Hotel, long since gone the way of old hotels.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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