Louisbourg Day 3 (The best day)

Wednesday August 25th, 2010 (Day 3)

Wednesday was the best day of the entire trip for me. Costumes, artifacts and more!

7:15 AM
Woke up to beat the alarm clock.

8:00 AM
Breakfast and it was my favourite; French Toast! This french toast was rolled in whole oats. It was absolutey fantasic.

8:30 AM to 9:00 AM
Drove down to the Visitor Centre, met up with group and bussed down to the Fort.

9:00 AM to 9:30
Had our morning coffee and tea and talked about what we were doing that day. We were going to go to the costume shop to talk to the costume curator and see the costumes.

10:00 AM to 11:00 AM
The curator, Elizabeth Tate, gave us a tour of the costume shop. She showed us the rooms where they kept both male and female costumes and explained some of the pieces such as the pannier which an upper class woman would wear under her dress to give her the belled hip look, and whale bone corests. We also were able to see the costumes for the men. I tried on the drummer's coat which was a justacourps, which I have always wanted. Maybe one day when I make more money I'll have one made. She took us down to a little room where they make prototypes of the costumes. They contract out the costume making but they research the design and find out what works. Once they have a prototype made, using the fabrics appropriate for the time period, they are sent off to be made. At the end of the tour, I asked if we could try on some tricorner hats. Larry joined me and we had many pictures taken.

11:00 AM
We went out to the excavation site as soon as we were finished with the costume tour. When we got there, I immediately found some iron nails. I found a piece of rock that had the tell tale sign of corroded iron on it, but I wasn't sure if tehre was anything inside. I got up to talk to the supervising archaeologist, and while I was other there, I was invited to dig in the interior area of the New England Powder Magazine. My group was digging in the exterior wall, looking for mainly glass and iron nails, but on the interior of the wall of the building they had found the floor boards, and had been finding things like buttons. The idea was that each one of us would come over while they removed the top soil and look for artifacts. Since I was already up, I was asked to participate first. At first all we found was iron and bottle glass which was different than the window glass I was previously finding. I asked if I should go get another one of the group since I had stayed for at least 3 or 4 topsoil removals. Blair, the guy I was working with who was a part of the archaeology crew told me to stay until we found something interesting.

11:30 AM
Around this time, we finally found something interesting. A tiny piece of yellow pottery could be seen in the dirt. Blair had to go into town and pick up the lunches, so he instructed another supervisor to come keep an eye on my excavation. He told her that he wanted me to excavate the piece of pottery by lunch. As he left, I began to excavate the item. The yellow glaze kept falling off, and I was instructed to keep it. I was told to put the artifacts in a dust pan as I went. I had many little pieces of chipped glaze wear covered in dirt. Finally, around 11:45 AM, I had excavated a piece of Staffordshire pottery. It was a little handle. Satisified, I asked if I should leave the site, or if I should clean up the corner of my area some more. The supervisor told me to clean it up a little, since lunch wasn't here yet.


12:10 PM
I glanced at my watch and saw it was past noon, but the lunch had not appeared yet, so I kept working. I noticed something sticking out of the ground where I was excavating. At first I thought it was a little nail. I pointed it out to my supervisor who exclaimed it was a buckle. I asked her if she wanted me to keep excavating it, or to leave it for someone else. She told me to continue. Once I got it out, I handed it to her. She told me it was near complete, then announced to the rest of the group that I had found a buckle. She then took my picture with it (the first picture in this blog). My little pottery piece was totally overshadowed by this find.

12:30 PM
Lunch had arrived and I was excited to tell everyone about my find. I didn't want to rub it in or anything, I was just excited. I had lunch, which was more exciting than the one I had yesterday (a ham sandwich). It was a chicken wrap and it was very good. I wish I had ordered another one in the week, but since we had to order before we had tasted the food, I decfided to play it safe and ordered a two ham sandwiches during the week.

1:00 PM to 3:15 PM
We went back to the site and had our group picture taken. Once our picture was taken, we went back to excavating. Everyone wanted to get into the 'prime' stuff as they were calling it amongst our group, so they could find something other than glass and iron. Unfortunately all was found was nails and glass. We were told we had to pack up early because the Fortress Association had bought us tickets to a dinner theatre event at the Fortress after dark. Since we had to meet up at 6:00, we all wanted some time to get dressed and freshened up before we went out. By the time we cleaned up, got back to the Chevalier House and sorted out rides, we all left for the bus around 4:30

5:00 PM
I went back to Cranberry Cove B&B to change my clothes, fix my make up and freshen up. Most of my pants were rather dirty by that time haha.

6:00 PM
Larry and I carpooled together back to the Fortress. All the cars had to meet up at another gate, and then we followed in a convoy back into the Fort. We were allowed to park our cars along the harbor street in the Fort, which was kind of cool.

6:30 to 9:00 PM
We had a 18th century style dinner in the Grandchamps restaurant, with an interactive play called For Love or Money going on as we ate. We had a beef stew with carrots, rice and turnips, freshly baked buns, and the entry was salmon with rice. For dessert it was a little chocolate brownie. The play was about a fisherman's daughter, Claudette, who wanted to make money so she could get married to someone with money. A guy by the name Laurent Chevalier who was a clerk but owed a Captain money for gambling debts. Chevalier bumped his debt over to the audience but said he was getting a new job with a rich family and he should be able to pay back his debt in time. Claudette meanwhile gets a job being a servant for a rich girl named Antionette. Laurent's job is to help the rich family's son get married to Antionette so they can use her money to pay off their own debts to the Captain. Augusta, the wife is horribly embarassed by her son Albert, and her husband George feels that the plan is rediculous as Albert has no interest in girls, only his books. Nerdish Albert just doesn't want to meet up with Antionette but they insist on having a party and inviting her. The night of the party Augusta hides Albert's glasses and he ends up embarassing himself and upsetting Antionette. Claudette goades Laurent for his stupid plan and refuses to help him. Antionette claims that she is going to leave for France, which would put Claudette out of her job. Claudette decides to help Laurent because Antionette would have to stay in Louisbourg if she was married to Albert, and she could keep her job. After numerous attempts to get them together, Albert and Ationette refuses to pair up. Laurent goes to the family's house, explaining he will try once again to get the two together. The Captain storms into the home of Augusta and George, demanding payment. The Captain realizes that Laurent's new job is working for a family that owes him debts. He laments that he needs the money so he can start his trading company when he returns to France the next day. Augusta and George reveal that they are banking on their son marrying Antionette and that will pay off their debts. Laurent had invited Antionette to the family's home, and she comes but says she is leaving for France and will not return because she cannot find a suitor who is romantic. The Captain woos her, and proposes to her on the spot, realizing that she has the money to finance his new company. Antionette accepts because he is so romantic to her. Augusta reveals to George that she really does love him, even after a small discussion in which she claims to not love him. Albert telsl Laurent and Claudette that books are absolutely wonderful. Laurent tells Claudette that now that his debts are paid, he does have a bit of money and a well paying job, and he would like to court her. Claudette accepts this and then the entire ensemble sings a finale song for the audience.

9:00 PM
I convinced some of our group to drive out to Kennington Cove. This cove is a beach, and also the area that James Wolfe landed with the British soldiers in order to take down Louisbourg in the Siege of 1758. I kicked off my socks and shoes and jumped into the Atlantic Ocean. It was my goal to swim in it, but I never had the time, nor the weather to. I tasted some sea water, and had a few pictures taken since the full moon was still out.

9:45 PM
Half of our group split off, and the rest of us went out to the Royal Battery. The Royal Battery was an area on the side of the fortress which would have had cannons alongside it to help protect the fort from an attack from the water front. There isn't much left of it now, but it would have been walled.

10:00 PM
Larry wanted to walk the lighthouse trail, but we ended up deciding once we got back to the lighthouse it was too dark, and way too narrow to drive the car through.

10:20 PM
We returned to the B&B and I uploaded the photos from that day as I got in the habit of doing.

12:00 AM
Once again, a late night for me! Finally went to bed at this point.