Shaker Village

After checking out of the house late Wednesday morning, we were able to get reservations to eat lunch at the village.  While they were getting our table ready, the kids explored.  There was this beautiful spiral staircase in the building where we were to eat.  The craftsmanship of the Shakers is amazing.  

Calleigh, Riley, Tori, Elizabeth, Lindsey, Colin, Skyeler

Lunch was delicious.  We were all starving after sleeping in and skipping breakfast.

We had a little bit of time to explore the village before our riverboat ride.  This is the Centre Family Dwelling. It had 40 rooms and was just under 25,000 square feet.  Many families would live in this house together.  The guide said that often those that lived in the house were the ones who were the most strict.  Different rooms now house a look at all aspects of Shaker life from bedrooms to school rooms to the apothecary.

In the basement we found a map of where the Shakers had established villages in the United States.  

A picture of a Grandfather Clock.  We learned a neat little fact in Bath.  A true antique Grandfather Clock will have the number 4 as IIII instead of IV.  Those with IV are from a later time period.  The clock in the Centre Family Dwelling had IIII.  Actually, all the clocks we saw in the village had IIII.

One of the bedrooms

A dining room

It would have been nice to have had more time to explore the village.  We barely made it through this house!  But we were looking forward to taking the riverboat ride.  So we loaded up the van and drove across the road and down to the river.