Connect with Pilgrims in Plymouth, Massachusetts

November is a fitting time for a family visit to Plymouth, Massachusetts, where Plimouth Patuxet Museums recreate the settlement where the Thanksgiving holiday began. Kids can meet costumed reenactors in authentic replicas of both the Pilgrims’ village and that of the native Patuxet people, and climb aboard Mayflower II to learn about the Pilgrims’ travels to the New World.

The museums emphasize interaction, so kids can enter the primitive homes and shops to see how the first English settlers lived and worked. They can try their hand at grinding corn or harvesting vegetables alongside a Pilgrim woman or participate in a muster drill and learn about how the Pilgrims prepared to keep their town safe. Kids especially enjoy trying games 17^th-century children would have played.

At the Patuxet Homesite, visitors learn about the Native people whose home this region has been for more than 12,000 years. Inside the authentic wetu house, kids warm up by the fire as they learn about the home and family life of Wampanoag communities in the 17^th century. Hands-on activities here include playing with toys made from animal bones or helping scrape the center from a log to make a dugout canoe.

A special exhibit, We Gather Together: Thanksgiving, Gratitude, and the Making of an American Holiday, focuses Thanksgiving’s origins as one of America’s most-loved holidays. This is where the annual tradition of gathering and giving thanks began as the two cultures came together for a meal in the autumn of 1621.

Families living in any of the six New England states can stay close to the museums at John Carver Inn and enjoy a 15 percent locals reward discount on rooms. The hotel is a favorite for families, with spacious rooms, an indoor pool, a waterslide and full-service spa. Wherever you live, book for big savings on visits in the winter or summer during the hotel’s Black Friday/Cyber Monday sale.

Between the two villages, Mayflower II, and the working reproduction of the Plymouth Colonists’ original 1636 grain mill, the Plimoth Pawtuxet Museums can easily fill a weekend of family travel.