Virginia Symphony Orchestra Performed In Yorktown Yesterday, Sept. 5th, 2009

The Virginia Symphony Orchestra performed yesterday at the monument in the Historic Area and did an outstanding job. The concert was on the green by the monument with the York River in the background. We had a spectacular full moon for the performance as well that added to the evening.

The show was opened by the Yorktown Fife and Drum corp which did it's usual fantastic performance. We captured some new video and will broadcast that soon. We also will be adding new photos to both our Virginia Symphony Orchestra Review and our Yorktown Fife and Drum Review sites. We will post the results when those pictures are added. Inn the mean time we have a lot of photos to process.

Gloucester County VA web site

Due to technical difficulties, our sister site, http://www.gloucestercounty-va.com is down. We were out of town getting new material and learning some new marketing techniques and missed the .com renewal. The site in the mean time and be found by clicking Here.



Thank you for your patience in the temporary delay.

New Town In Williamsburg, Changing Times, Part One

Just a few short years ago, the area now known as New Town in Williamsburg was nothing more than a fairly dense wooded area. Today it is a mini metropolis. A city within a city. New town is one of several of these projects that is forever changing the landscape of Williamsburg. Last year the New Town projects was thriving fairly well with lots of people in the shopping district, today more empty spaces exist than did last year and the market to fill these stores is tougher than ever in today's economy.

The row houses have seemed to fill up fairly well, despite their salt and pepper look. Overall the architecture is fitting within the Williamsburg atmosphere but parking is horrible. Views from many of the townhouses are of parking lots. At least one never has to worry about mowing a lawn as there are no lawns to be had. From a business standpoint, the area was doing well until the latest economic conditions which now seem to be crushing the area especially in light of the new competition. Williamsburg seemed immune to the ravages of a slow economy, but that is now fading very quickly.

It seems to many people were over zealous about the growth potential of the area. Although New Town is one of our favorite places to shop these days, we see rapid decay setting in on the area. There have always been a number of empty store fronts and more office space than could be filled, but the numbers are higher now than before. Some businesses have already moved out, no real new one coming in quick to fill the spaces. There are some strong retailers in the area, but for how long? Some of our favorites are Panera Breads, Trader Joe's which is incredible, Barnes and Noble and Bath and Bodyworks. Old Navy is always worth a stop for their clearance items.

This is the first part in our series of changing times in Williamsburg. We will be covering all the growth the area has experienced over the past few years and take a deeper look into the impact it is having. We will include a detailed slide show with each post to show what Williamsburg looks like these days as we have a lot of readers that have not been to the area in some time and like to keep up with what is going on.

The Picture accompanied by the slide show is a representation of what the area looked like before New Town was developed. New Town is located along Monticello Avenue and Ironbound Road.

Gloucester County Renaissance Fair Has One Day Left, Sunday July 19th, 2009

There is still a chance to get on over to Gloucester for the Renaissance festival. We spent a good part of the day there and it is a very well orchestrated event. There is fun for everyone of all ages as there is music, dance, fencing, games, belly dancing, and more all for your enjoyment. Having attended events nearly every weekend, we are rather pleased with this one. So clear your calendar and and get on over to the Historic Court House area, about 10 miles past the Coleman bridge, just follow the signs. You will not be disappointed.

Renaissance Festival Over In Gloucester County This Weekend, July 18th & 19th, 2009

Gloucester County is hosting it's 3rd annual Renaissance Festival this coming weekend, July 18th and 19th at the historic Courthouse area. Time to get into the car and head out over and party Gloucester style. So take a break from colonialism and step back further in time and join the fun of the Renaissance. Food fun and games abound at the festival this year. What? You want more information? Okay, here it is. CLICK HERE.

Colemand Bridge View From Yorktown

This is a new photo we just took of the Coleman Bridge at night time from the Yorktown side. We got some nice golden hews from the lights on the bridge.

Fireworks From Colonial Williamsburg, July 4th, 2009

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July weekend. Colonial Williamsburg had a few surprises this year. The fireworks were the typical 15 minutes before the grand finale, but a few moments after the grand finale, a second grand finale began, followed by yet a third grand finale that also didn't seem to want to end. We captured most of it here on video. Enjoy.

Fife and Drum Junior Corp Performing in Colonial Williamsburg, July 4th, 2009

The pre show at Colonial Williamsburg this year consisted of a one hour set of the Fife and Drum Corps. The show started with the Junior corp on stage. We shot all but two tunes due to batteries dying and running out of memory. The rest we captured and we are working as fast as we can to process all the clips and get them on line for everyone. We have about 5 clips up now and we are working on another 13. We are going to do a special here for this site only and host the entire show once it is finished. So stay tuned.

Belle Mount Vineyards Rep Says Northern Neck Wineries Not Worth Our Time

We are at the tail end of finishing up an on line driving tour of historic churches that includes the United States only standing original Gothic church that is also one of our nations oldest structures, Bruton parish church in Colonial Williamsburg, Grace Church in Yorktown, St Peter's church, where George Washington got married, in New Kent county and many other incredible sites. We went to an incredibly small and boring, well Kilmarnock called it a wine festival, it was more like a snooze festival, to speak to some of the wineries there to stir up interest in our up coming project of an on line wine tour that we expect to start at the Williamsburg winery and wrap up at Oak Crest in the Northern Neck.

Inclusion into the driving tour is free so long as the owners of the winery opt in within one week of notification from us, otherwise we have a fee of somewhere around $1,000.00 if the winery owners wait to long. We have put this in place because we are tired of sending out numerous emails and making lots of calls and never getting a response from people. It's like an insurance policy for us so we can meet our own deadlines for what we say the time frame for a completed project will be. Well the rep couldn't listen to us and couldn't get past the $1,000.00 inclusion fee, never bothering to listen to the free part.

So Belle Mount Vineyards is off our lists and will not be included in our tour. How anyone can possibly say no to free advertising is beyond us, but like I said, he wasn't listening to us anyway. Why the headline then? Because he told us that he was pretty confident that he could speak for all the winery owners of the Northern Neck that they too would have no interest in a free inclusion into our driving tour promotions. We guess this guy has political aspirations for congress or a Senate seat in the near future.

White Cloud Yacht Slide Show Exclusive

We are posting an exclusive slide show of the White Cloud while she was anchored in Yorktown on June 20th, 2009. We are posting this slide show here and on our sister site, Gloucester Links & News. We had permission to photograph the ship up close and now we are bringing to you the latest pictures we have. Enjoy.

7th Virginia Regiment Coming To Yorktown, July 4th

The 7th Virginia Regiment will be coming to Yorktown on the 4th of July. They are a group of reenactors of Revolutionary War Americans. They teach living history by going more in depth of what it was like for a typical colonial soldier during the 18th century period than one would normally find at someplace like Colonial Williamsburg. This group does a fantastic job, so be sure to catch them while they are here. They only make it into the area twice a year. Huzarr!

Historic Christ Church, A Hidden Gem of SE Virginia Over In Lancaster County

We just finished creating a slide show of the Historic Christ Church over in Lancaster County, VA. Thought we would share this with you. The trip is about an hour away from Williamsburg and well worth the drive. This site is open to the public and they have a very nice museum there that is the latest high tech in interactivity. Click Here to check out our web site on the Historic Christ Church and to get directions to the site.

White Cloud Ship In Yorktown Today, The 69th Largest Yacht In The World

The White Cloud ship was anchored in Yorktown today, June 20th, 2009. She is listed with Power Motor Yachts top 100 largest yachts in the world coming in at number 69. The White Cloud was owned by a Dutchman who liked sailing her around the world. She is now American owned and her new owner equally likes to take her around the world.

We had a chance to do a fairly extensive photo shoot of her and as soon as we are done processing the pictures we will let you all know. The owner was in Yorktown attending a wedding at the river walk. This ship is a really beauty.

Virginia Symphony Orchestra Web Site Featuring Pictures And More Now Up

We just finished putting up our main review site of the Virginia Symphony Orchestra. This site contains pictures that we took at the Gloucester, Virginia concert held on May 30th, 2009. The site will continue to be expanded as we go through more of our picture files and continue to attend their local concerts. We have two very rare videos on the site that we produced last year. We are not allowed to produce any more so these are the only two you will see on the entire web unless the Virginia Symphony Orchestra decides to start loading videos themselves which is something we do not foresee happening. That's to bad. How is the world or even the local area supposed to learn more about this fine orchestra if they can not see or hear them in advance?

Our question we have though, a live, free, public performance, where the musicians are being paid to perform music they did not write, in an orchestra they do not own, how the VSO can possibly claim there is a digital rights management issue in recording the live, free, public performance of music the VSO does not own is really beyond us. The keys here being both Free and Public Performance. Not allowing video recording a Free Public performance is pretty much against the 1st amendment of free press, no? The government is free to record the public, businesses are free to record the public, the public is free to record the public, where did the policy change for the VSO? As we see it, a free public performance is subject to the public's rights under any other circumstances so long as it does not violate privacy issues.

If the issues are copyright infringement, then why is the VSO playing public performances of music not in the public domain? We are going to honor their request to not record them for now. We are not seeking to pick a fight with them over this either. We are simply pointing out the obvious. We think very highly of the VSO and we do understand their need to a certain amount of protection. We think high enough of the VSO that we are offering on this site, a donation to them as they are a non profit foundation. Chuck Thompson and TTC Media has a donation policy where we openly and freely donate to non profit organizations all the time. All they have to do is contact us and we will get their donation to them within a few days. Our main site has a list of all the non profit entities we have already made donations to. To see the site we created for the VSO, please CLICK HERE.

Chuck Thompson and TTC Media update on our work

Chuck Thompson and TTC Media presents in the this video, an update as to where we are and the type of work we are doing along with an inside look as to what is coming. We are just at about 40 web sites up and running now. We took down a number of sites we were no longer happy with and put up a number of new ones. We have at least 15 more in the works or planned over the next month to 6 weeks alone. At the moment we have more content to get out than we have time to get it out. We still have many secrets we are holding on to that are planned as we are waiting for approval from some organizations.

For now we will just say that we are just warming up.

Kalmar Nyckel Was In Yorktown Over The Past Weekend, June 13th & 14th, 2009

The Kalmar Nyckel was at the Yorktown waterside this past weekend. An incredible reproduction Swedish 1625 2oo tonne Pinnace ship. This ship has over 8 miles of rope on her. We had the privilege to meet the Captain and the crew who gave us a tour of the ship and some of it's history. The ship was hand crafted and made by Allen C Rawl. The concept for this ship happened back in 1934 when the King of Sweden visited the United States. In 1994 the project was undertaken 50 years after it's concept. The sail area is 7,600 square feet. This ship took about 3 years to complete and it's first voyage was in 1997. The Kalmar Nyckel was commissioned in May of 1998.

Some background history. The original Kalmar Nyckel was one of America's pioneering colonial ships. Her historical significance rivals that of the Mayflower, yet her remarkable story has seldom been told. This ship first came to America leaving behind 24 passengers of Finnish, German, Swedish and and Dutch decent to colonize the new world. The Kalmar Nyckel made a total of 4 voyages between Sweden and the colonies, more than any other ship of the era.

The Kalmar Nyckel is owned by the Kalmar Nyckel foundation in Wilmington, Delaware, which is where her base is. The maintenance and upkeep are all funded by ship cruises. CLICK HERE to learn more about the Kalmar Nyckel and the foundation.

She is often mistaken for a pirate ship, but that is okay, the foundation is aware of this and takes full advantage of such. She was at the Blackbeard Festival in Hampton the week before and she will be at the Norfolk Harbor Festival July 3rd, 4th and 5th. We highly recommend the trip to go see her and take one of the daily cruises. At Yorktown there were two types of cruises available on her. The day cruise was a pirate cruise while the night one was a more reserved sunset cruise.

Blackbeard's Crew Teaches Young Children How To Be A Pirate

The Blackbeard's Crew were caught on camera teaching young children how to be pirates. Guess these scurvy dogs can't get help at the older levels anymore so now they are after our boys and girls while they are still young and impressionable. Hide your children and run whenever you see these pirates roaming the beaches. They may just grab Johnnie and little Suzie and whisk them off to sea.

Darcy Nair Was Spotted At The Blackbeard Festival

We spotted Darcy Nair, the highly talented Hammered Dulcimer musician and entertainer at the Blackbeard Festival this past weekend and she was very kind to allow us to shoot a video of her playing. We requested the song in this video as we had heard her playing it to others and we really enjoyed the tune. Darcy plays all over the Washington, DC metro area and is a highly requested musician. You can get more information on her web site. Visit Darcy Nair by CLICKING HERE.

House of Cadarn, Live at the Blackbeard Festival in Hampton, June 7th, 2009

The house of Cadarn was another act at the Blackbeard Festival in Hampton last weekend. It was hard to capture a good video of these musicians, and this video really does not do them any justice, they were a great act for the show and a lot of people spent a plenty of time to stop and enjoy the show instead of just walking by.


If you have never made it to a Blackbeard's Crew event, or the Blackbeard Festival, let us tell you that you are missing a wonderful time that is fun no matter what your age is. They have something for everyone from the kids to Grandma and grandpa.

Ceol Leinn plays at the Blackbeard Festival in Hampton, Virginia

We caught this act live at the Blackbeard Festival in Hampton, Virginia. The band's name is pronounced (Key-Ole Lane-Ya). We Learned that they are not a pirate band but instead are a Celtic band that plays shows all over the east coast. If you get a chance to catch their act, we highly recommend you do so. You won't be disappointed. We put up a special review site you might want to check out with photos and about 12 videos. CLICK HERE for the site.

The Blackbeard Festival featuring Blackbeard's Crew attracted some 75,000 people from all over the nation. The show was their 10th anniversary event and was said to be their best ever. Vendors lined the streets with everything from food to period clothing, pirate flags, drinks and more. The streets were closed off to traffic the entire weekend for about a 3 block radius around the waterside.

Blackbeard's Crew To Raid City of Hampton, Virginia June 6th and 7th

Blackbeard and his crew are getting ready to raid Hampton, Virginia this weekend, June 6th and 7th. These scalawags are gearing up to tear up the town with their 10th anniversary annual event. Expect some serious sea battles, sword fights, pirate songs and an all out great time at this years event. There are over 100 pirates expected to be at this event this year from all over the nation. These scurvy dogs always put on a great performance, so unless you have a wedding to go to, get yer butts down to Hampton to see these folks raid and loot everything in sight. ARRGH!

Uncle Sam Wants You In The US Army

Uncle Sam was at the Yorktown Memorial Day service and when we asked him what message he had for our nation, he told us that he wants you for the US Army. Living History done right by the fine people behind Historical Yorktown, Yorktown, Virginia.

Congressman Rob Wittman in Yorktown, Memorial Day, May 25th, 2009

Congressman Rob Wittman had a very busy morning on Memorial day visiting both Colonial Williamsburg and Yorktown directly afterward, paying tribute to our troops. Mr Wittman was well received at these events proving to be a popular man of the people.

21 Gun Salute followed by Taps at Yorktown on Memorial Day, May 25th, 2009

21 gun Salute to our nations forces followed by Taps. Honoring all those that have fought for our nation, our freedom and our way of life.

Yorktown Fife and Drum Corp on Memorial Day, May 25th, 2009

The Yorktown Fife and Drum Corp perform at Historic Yorktown on Memorial Day, May 25th, 2009. An outstanding performance by all.

Scottish Bag Pipes in Colonial Williamsburg at Bruton Parish

We had the privilege to film this gentleman while he performed outside of Bruton Parish church in Colonial Williamsburg on May 16th, 2009. The time was about 7:45 PM just before a concert in the church. I myself love listening to the bag pipes and it is a rare pleasure when one can get to view a musician actually play them. One of the many incredible events that take place around the Williamsburg Triangle.

US Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corp New Site

We just finished putting up a new site for the United States Old Guard Fife and Drum Corp that contains our 7 video mini series as well as some of our pictures taken during the event this past weekend. May 16th, 2009 was the day they were on the field here in Colonial Williamsburg. CLICK HERE to visit the new site.

United States Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corp Video

This is one of our videos we took while the United States Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps played in CW on May 16th, 2009. We have a total of 7 videos we are in the process of producing. 3 are up so far on You Tube with 4 more to go. Plus we have a number of other Fife and Drum corp videos and other specials to get through over the next few days. We will be putting up some extra web sites to highlight these videos and other really great works we are in the middle of.

The Moore House, Yorktown, Virginia

This is one of our many video tours. The Moore house was a significant place during both the American Revolution and the Civil War. A must see for any history buff of either part of American History.

Trader Joe's, A Great Place To Shop

We have to report on one of our favorite places to shop. Although the Historic triangle is loaded with a tremendous amount of great places to visit and shop, one of the top best of the best is without question, Trader Joe's. We have been shopping there for some time now and they constantly continue to impress us more on each visit.

So we spoke to the management of the store in Williamsburg, though it was not an official interview, the conversation started with our praise of their constant outstanding attention to the customer. It's what they call the customer experience. Let me tell you, you have to visit this place to truly understand what the customer experience is. It's far and above just really great customer service. So much so that Trader Joe's has no competition in this market. Everyone we met loves their job. (This is truly rare). Every company in the world could learn from these folks. Trader Joe's has earned our dedicated loyalty for years to come. Oh, by the way, their prices are equally outstanding and mostly unmatched.

Pictorial Video Tour of Colonial Williamsburg

This is the first in our series of Pictorial tours around the historic triangle. We are kicking it off with Colonial Williamsburg. We have a lot more to come.

Blackbeard's Pirates New Web Site

We just finished adding a new site to our little spiderweb for the Blackbeard's Pirates, I mean Blackbeard's Crew. Please visit our new site by Clicking Here to see more detailed information about the event in Yorktown and to learn more about the people behind Blackbeard's Crew.

Yorktown Seized by Blackbeard's Pirates, Blackbeard's Crew

Yorktown was seized yesterday, (May 2nd, 2009), by Blackbeard's Crew. A surrey bunch they were too. Blasting the area with their canons, recruiting new pirates and training them for battle, showing those of us who were captured what life was like in the days of the early part of the 18th century, overall giving us a great idea of what seafaring life was like.

Presented by Blackbeard's Crew from the Hampton area of Virginia, these scalawags put on a great performance. Impressed with the detail of their costumes and camp exhibits, this team of men and women did a fantastic job of entertaining the guests of Yorktown Beach. To learn more about Blackbeard's Crew, please Click Here to visit their web site.

To see more details and some video on the day's event, we will soon be posting a link to a new site we are putting up on the event.

Battle of the Hook New Video

The Battle of the Hook took place in Gloucester Virginia days before the Battle at Yorktown and was an instrumental battle that cut off the escape route for the British troops. This video is of the re enactment that took place back in October of 2008. It was held at the Inn at Warner Hall in Gloucester, VA.

This video we call our teaser video and is a part of our mini series we have put up on several sites. We put a link to our new Battle of the Hook site at the bottom of this site. If you would like to see the other 4 videos we created for the site or to see pictures from the event, please take a moment and check it out.

Find Anyone In Williamsburg Or Anywhere Else In The USA

People searches are now becoming the number one use of the internet. Because of this we have created our own search engine designed to help you locate anyone you are looking for. Just go to this link and type in information on the person you are looking for. http://aaafindme.com/. And we hope you find that long lost friend.