Well, I'm back from Virginia. I must first comment on the roads--- the planning and mapping out of the few towns that we visited left a lot to be desired. The condition of the roads made me ever-grateful that I live in NC. We visited Busch Gardens and Water Country USA. We had "bounce tickets" which meant we could go back and forth between them for two days. Busch Gardens has four roller coasters-- Alpengeist, Loch Ness Monster, Apollo's Chariot, and Big Bad Wolf (pictured at left). My sister and our friends (Taylor and Micheala) road all of these multiple times. (For those of you who don't know...I am terrified of roller coasters, their speeds, their drops, whatever...hate them. Very much afraid of them, maybe from watching too many news stories where they crash or break down.) Anyway, the three of them bugged me incessantly to ride one of them. I relented after an hour or so after they told me that Big Bad Wolf didn't drop--- it was just a bunch of curves. Okay, I thought. I can do this. I tried to back out multiple times while we waited in line. Not a chance. I got on and after the first curve, realized that I should never have gotten on the ride to begin with. Okay, so it's drops are only 99 feet each, but it was way to much for someone who is deathly afraid of roller coasters to begin with (and who has also been told that there aren't any drops...that this one is easier than the small roller coasters at the state fair.) Busch gardens...unless you are five, or you love roller coasters, is really a bunch of shows to take in. We saw Irish dancers, a pet show (quite cute) and explored the "European continent" in little shops and cafes. It's a nice place. The water park was more my style and we had a great time. We went to both parks each day. But the first day we got up there, we went to William and Mary College. It was founded in 1693, and was the second oldest college in the country (behind Harvard). It's where former presidents Jefferson, Washington, Monroe and Tyler all went to school. It was the first school to adopt the Honor Code (a system devised by Jefferson himself) and Jefferson and his friends also developed the premier academic society Phi Beta Kappa at W and M in 1776. I really liked the feel of the campus, the academic courses, and the size of the school (though something bigger might be more for me), but the town where it is located is just too small. The nearest movie theater, for instance, is an hour away. I think big-city life is more for me, not the small-town setting. It's a wonderful school, though, it's just not for me. At the end of July we're heading to D.C. to check out three schools, and hopefully I'll be checking out Boston and NYC as well. In the meantime, I'm waiting for my AP test scores and my school schedule to come in the mail. *cross fingers*