Chincoteague Island - Beautiful (wine country tours) Land Across the Water

August 12th, 2009 admin Posted in travel |

By Sam Serio A

Native American tribes were thriving on what is now Virginia’s Eastern Shore for more than twenty centuries when Captain John Smith arrived in 1607. One of these tribes, led by Chief Barabokees and Emperor Waskawampe, had claimed as their own an island five miles off the Virginia coast, calling it Chincoteague, or “The Beautiful Land across the Water.” The Assateague tribe gave their name to the barrier island just to the east of Chincoteague.

The Virginia and Maryland Indian tribes cherished Chincoteague, Assateague, and the other barrier islands for their rich stores of game and shellfish. They valued the shells of the whelk so much, in fact, that they used them to create strips of beadwork, referred to as “Roanoke.” Roanoke was considered legal tender among the tribes, who traded for other goods.
Although Chincoteague Islanders no longer use shells to fund their daily lives, they cherish their “Beautiful Land across the Water” as much as the Native Americans did four centuries ago. The marshes, forests, and beaches of Chincoteague and Assateague fill the islanders’ lives with year-long beauty, and provide a million annual visitors with glimpses of nature that have changed little since the islands’ paths were followed by Indians stalking wild game.
Much of Chincoteague Island’s timelessness has been preserved in the work of the Island’s gifted artists’ colony. Canvases depicting sunrise over wetland grasses stretching as far as the eye can see, or capturing a moment of perfect stillness before a great white egret sets down at Goose Pond recall scenes which would have greeted the Algonquins on their approach to the Beautiful Land across the Water. The lines of a perfectly carved Chincoteague swan decoy provide a lasting memory of these magnificent birds swimming along the Chincoteague marshes at twilight.
The fields, beaches, and wetlands of Chincoteague and Assateague have fed and sheltered countless millions of migratory birds traveling the Atlantic Flyway through the centuries. The waterfowl, as well as the Island’s native deer population, were staples of the Native American diet. Bow hunters in limited numbers are still permitted to hunt deer on Assateague in order to control their population.
The island forests echo with the calls of nesting songbirds, like warblers, red-winged blackbirds, sparrows, and nut hatches. During the summer their songs are joined by those of cardinals, blue jays, and finches, while the staccato of woodpeckers keeps time.
The Native Americans relied not only on Chincoteague’s game but on the bounty of her waters for their survival. That bounty still draws a steady stream of recreational fishers each year, arriving in the spring for the first of the flounder runs, and continuing through the summer to head for deeper water to go after sharks, tuna bluefish, and in late July, the greatest of all game fish, marlin.
Then there are the oysters, clams, and crabs. The first Europeans to arrive on Virginia’s Eastern Shore in 1607 startled a group of Native Americans roasting a shellfish feast, and dined on the clams, crabs, and oysters when the Indians disappeared into the forest. By the 1800s The Beautiful Land across the Water had become one of America’s premiere suppliers of clams and oysters.
Beautiful, bountiful, and bright with the promise of adventure, Chincoteague Island has something for everyone!

Sam Serio is the Producer of the Chincoteague Blueberry Festival and the Chincoteague Daffodil Festival. He is also a partner in two unique Chincoteague informational websites. www.chincoteagueislandvacations.com and www.chincoteagueoutlook.com reveal Chincoteague to be a wonderful family oriented vacation destination through videos, interviews and articles.

Moving Overseas and Your Teen

By Gerry Lamb

Let’s face it: not many people find travel books as fascinating reading. Although people do find other places interesting, there’s just not much that can be said for books which contain a thousand obscure facts about different countries crammed into a book. Although this might sound like fun for a trivia geek, it just sounds boring to other people. The book Club Expat: a Teenager’s Guide to Moving Overseas, however, shows that there still is hope for the travel book industry.

This book, authored by the brothers Aniket and Akash Shah, certainly has caught people by surprise. It is part biography, part travel guide and a whole great guide to life. What separates it from other books, however, is the prose. The authors wrote the book in a unique style that just promises to grab the readers and suck them into the world within the book. They let the readers experience a ride full of wonder, loops and leaps and dives.

Moving overseas will always be hard on a teenager. It would be like saying goodbye to a world which they have only begun to explore. It is often the case that a teenager will feel cheated as though you gave him or her some hope and then dashed it against the rocks of reality. In times like this, a teenager needs reassurance that everything will be okay. They need to know that their lives will not end simply because they are moving overseas. The book Club Expat: a Teenager’s Guide to Moving Overseas definitely does the job!

Club Expat: a Teenager’s Guide to Moving Overseas teaches teenagers how to embrace what life throws at them. It teaches them how to look at the move from another perspective. It teaches them to find the core of stability within the whirlwind caused by the decision to move.

The book Club Expat: a Teenager’s Guide to Moving Overseas is a must-read for any teenager moving overseas. The book will help them see the move as a new adventure. It will help them see the move as a fresh start in life. It will help them realize that it isn’t really as earth-shattering as they fear.

Most people found the books very helpful because of the various tips and bits of advice that can be found inside. These useful tidbits can help teenagers survive the little challenges of life as an expatriate.

At first, the book seems to be a simple guide for teens on how to survive moving overseas. However, reading it, people will realize that the ultimate lesson found in this gem is the lesson of life itself. There are certain events in our life that people cannot do anything about. We cannot change what happens in our lives. What we can change is the way we react to it.

The whole book Club Expat: a Teenager’s Guide to Moving Overseas is a heartwarming book filled with useful lessons regarding life and living. It tells us how you should recognize and embrace every opportunity life can give you. It shows how you should take a look at what life throws at you and recognize how you can use those projectiles for your growth.

Club Expat: a Teenager’s Guide to Moving Overseas is a great read, filled with lessons that can help you face life with confidence.

Want to find out about types of mice, what do rabbits eat and other information? Get tips from the Interesting Animals website.

Find Wine Tasting Tours Around The World