Our tour of Charlottesville was a fantastic one, principally due to Ashton being such a great tour guide. Charlottesville is a funky little town, steeped in Jeffersonian tradition. Certainly one of the greatest minds to contribute so much to American history, we felt indebted to visit the many testaments to Thomas Jefferson’s greatness. So off we set to visit his home in Monticello. But alas, after some 10 miles of biking over VA rolling hills, we found ourselves facing a steep entrance fee of $20/person with no student discount (!) except for UVA students. We would have felt remiss to skip this great monument, but $20 is just a bit too stiff to see a dead dude’s house when you don’t have any income. So, at Ashton’s suggestion we dodged the entrance fee, rode our bikes up the tour bus road, locked our bikes up to some trees in plain sight and walked onto the grounds without any trouble. Although the compound was beautiful, with great views of Charlottesville, I spent some effort to assuage my guilt for breaking into our forefather’s house. But as we walked the grounds we found the slave’s quarters and learned that Jefferson, who argued through his political career for abolition of slavery and indentured servitude, had 110 slaves, half of which were children, of which he only freed 2 in his life and only 5 in his will. Having just stolen entrance to the grounds (which was worth something to me, though not $20), it gave me some pause to think about where to draw the lines between ends and means on this trip and going forward. No great resolution, but we had a super time in C-ville and may well come back someday for a more extended visit.
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