Description: Mark Twain House tours were $12 for adults, $5 for kids 6 to 16, free for preschoolers. The tour lasts for about an hour and includes walking up about 3 flights of stairs. We decided to risk it, knowing we had to leave the stroller behind.
The tour started out in the Mark Twain Museum. The Museum is a modern building, with interesting Mark Twain quotes carved in bricks in the walls. We walked a staircase with very wide steps up and around and out. Our tour guide did not seem very happy to have 3 small kids on the tour, but too bad for him.
We walked over to a house the Mark Twain lived in with his family for about 7 years. The house is kept locked and you can only get in on a guided tour. We were led through several rooms, after being warned that pictures and videos were not allowed, and to turn off cell phones. We were also told we could walk on the floors, but were not allowed to touch anything in the house including walls and furniture.
The tour started in the great hall which was decorated by Tiffany (of glass fame). Then into the front parlour, the dining room, and the den. Then upstairs (we’re allowed to touch the banister (that Mark Twain touched everyday!), for safety J. On the second floor are the family bedrooms, the parents, the eldest daughter, and the middle/youngest daughter, then a room that was used as a classroom for the children. We can also see a bathroom. On the third floor was the billiards room and a butlers room. I left the tour because the baby was getting agitated and the 4-year-old was getting bored. We met up with the rest of the group a few minutes later outside, after they came down the back stairs.
We used Mapquest to find the place, which worked kind of weird because we ended up at the back of the museum, but that was ok.
The best part of the tour was that we found a list of all the sayings back at the ticket desk where we had left the stroller. The tour was fine, but not for little kids. The 4-year-old could have finished, but decided she’d rather come with me outside. The baby might have been ok if it wasn’t close to nap time, but really, there are lots more interesting things for them.
We didn’t stay to see the Ken Burns movie that was showing in the Museum after the tour. The kids were too restless for that.
Overall, it was interesting, but it was too expensive to take the kids and miss parts of it.
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