Colonial Williamsburg is a major tourist attraction, and it is especially popular at Thanksgiving with the holiday decorations and special events. You can spend as little or as much as you want and stay as long as you can afford. The mile-long Duke of Gloucester Street is free and open to the public, but you must buy a ticket to enter the foundation properties.
The venue is popular with families as well as those who have aninterest in history. The children love the period costumes, the live demonstrations of 18th Century crafts, and the dramatization of the official tours. Frankly, we got a little tired of the lengthy stories and affected dialect of some of the tour guides who assumed the role of an 18th Century personality. Two out of three were just too "cute" to be believable, and a little more information about the property itself would have been more useful. This approach is popular because it focuses on the lifestyles of the period rather than on the buildings per se.
The accommodations of the foundation are expensive and so are the meals at the period taverns, but there are many inexpensive motels and cafes nearby if you're on a budget. If you don't get a ticket for admission to their buildings, you still can buy a ticket to use the shuttle buses from the visitor center. The shuttles are frequent and highly recommended because the historical area is quite large and there is limited parking within the area. They are equipped to handle the handicapped. The commercial district, known as the merchants’ area, has the usual tourist shops but it doesn't have the usual kitschy appearance.
Nearby attractions include Jamestown and Yorktown that are reached via the Colonial Parkway. Jamestown includes both a tour of the National Park Service site & museum on the peninsula and a commercial reconstruction nearby known as the Jamestown Settlement. Busch Gardens is a commercial attraction with rides, etc. primarily for the children.
Both the city and the historic area have developed to attract a large number of visitors but do not have the hectic atmosphere of most large tourist attractions. The crowds may be larger in the summer, but even on this holiday weekend most people were simply enjoying a leisurely stroll and chatting with neighbors in a very friendly atmosphere. The locals seem to enjoy the tourists rather than resent us, and we talked with other dog lovers on the street and an older local couple at dinner.