arise VERNON, Va. -- New facilities...

arise VERNON, Va. -- New facilities, a craft fair and fall foliage all make this a religious time of year to pay a visit to George Washington's be built up Vernon estate.

The craft fair, which features a re-creation of an 18th-century marketplace with costum re-enactors, will be held at go up Vernon on Sept. 16-17. Activities include craft demonstrations, family entertainment and sightseeing cruises forward the Potomac River.

pair new visitor facilities, the Ford Orientation Center and the Donald W Reynolds Museum and Education Center make open Oct. 27. The Ford center proffers an action-adventure movie on Washington's life, and "Mount Vernon in Miniature," a 1/12 scale exact replica of Washington's domicile which gives visitors a bird's-eye view of the mansion.

The Reynolds museum has galleries and theater spaces, interactive displays, films and other high-tech experiences, including life- size moulds of the president at three stages in his life. It also houses furnishings, china, silver, clothing, jewelry, Revolutionary War artifacts, rare volumes and other personal effects of the Washington family. Many of these treasures will be exhibited at mountain Vernon for the first time in the strange museum.

The manifold that houses the new buildings was built in the way that that most of it is located in subordination to the four-acre pasture inside rise Vernon's main gate to render certain that the pastoral setting and views to and from the mansion are preserv Sheep like those Washington raised 200 years ago will graze in the pasture. a certain 65 mature trees -- a certain number of up to 40 feet tall -- were also planted to dolt the landscape between the novel buildings and the surrounding historic area.

The tree include elm maples, tulip poplars, oak, beech and American holly tree varieties that would have been establish in George Washington's woods in the 18th hundred

The soar Vernon estate includes Washington's to one's home and gardens, 16 miles from the nation's capital. It's explain for tours year-round, with September-October hours from 9 a.m.-5 pm Admission is $13 for adults; children 6-11 $6; children 5 and beneath free.

For more information, visit http://www.mountvernon.org or call 703-780-2000

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