L'Hermione in Yorktown - Part 2, a Pictorial by Carrie Fancett Pagels

L'Hermione from Yorktown Beach at Riverwalk

L'Hermione sailed into Yorktown on Friday morning and was then moored at the dock. Many fundraisers have been taking place in both France and the United States. Admission was FREE but to get a spot you had to be there many hours ahead. When rain threatened on Friday, my husband agreed to return at the recommended 8 a.m. on Saturday to get us tickets for that morning. As you can see, cloud cover was dense. The Godspeed, from Jamestown, was also moored (in front of L'Hermione). If you will look to the left in the picture below you will see that the Godspeed is only a fraction of the size of L'Hermione, which was a warship.

L'Hermione sails and rigging against dark sky!

L'Hermione with the Godspeed in front

Closeup of the canons on L'Hermione

Look at those sails on L'Hermione!

L'Hermione had hundreds of ropes!

The sheer number of ropes and the height and width of the rigging and sails was astounding!!!

Tours were about twenty minutes, you simply circle the deck. Some of the crew were willing to answer questions. Since my husband is a boat engineer working on military vessels, it was interesting the things he asked and the answers he got. And I got to ask a question in my very rusty French when I asked a young woman why she'd volunteered--she said it was "a dream".

L'Hermione from the bow

Isn't this a GORGEOUS frigate?  I love the lion masthead, which is so impressive. By the way, that is the Coleman Bridge, AKA The Gloucester Bridge, which connects the peninsula to Gloucester, Virginia. Did you know -- The York River is one of the deepest rivers in the world. 

L'Hermione bow, masthead

Question: Is the Hermione frigate coming to your city? I hope you get to go! Read my previous post and be sure to click through to check the schedule. I highly recommend this as a family-friendly activity (at least it was for our little family!) That might even end up being our Christmas picture! A kind French family took our picture (you could hear French being spoken everywhere and some crew members couldn't speak English.) We discovered these kind people, who took our picture, are here from NATO and actually live in Hampton Roads--which only goes to show how the French-American military connection continues yet today!