We saw regiments march to their places on the battlefield, accompanied by fife and drum, as it started to rain. Crouching under trees on the perimeter, we covered our ears as the muskets exploded in clouds of smoke. The re-enactors really got into character. “Stand fast, men!” one exclaimed to his comrades in a thick Scottish brogue, as a Red Coat lay beside him. Paulina worried that the fallen were actually dead. Eventually she saw for herself as the soldier got up and walked off the battlefield. I explained that in real life, it might not be so easy.

To help defray the cost of future visits, my husband forked over $75 to become a Friend of Fort Ticonderoga, entitling us to take a lantern tour by night. (They are no longer offered, alas.) We smelled the military encampment before we saw it — the smoke from wood-burning fires filling the cool evening air. The “American regiments” and their families huddled around campfires in front of each tent, adjacent to the enemy, as fireflies pulsed and crickets chirped. Across the field, a makeshift tavern sold rum punch in metal cups.

By the end of the night, the children pleaded with us to become war re-enactors, so we could camp out next time, instead of staying in a motel.

I briefly considered it (especially after the rum punch), but finally drew a line in the rich Adirondack Park soil, explaining that it would cost hundreds of dollars to get up to speed with the authentic furniture, garb and accouterments.

But over the next few years, we visited Fort Ti regularly, though not as re-enactors, sometimes just to tour the 2,000-acre grounds, gardens and museum. During one visit, the children marched with soldiers in the stone-walled courtyard, performing military drills with toy muskets. Paulina and I watched couples take part in an English country dance. We would have loved to join in, but didn’t quite feel welcome, me in my Polo shirt and Paulina in modern footwear. We ate fresh bread — just baked in an outdoor oven — as we wandered about, outsiders soaking in the sights and sounds of what it was like not just to die at Fort Ticonderoga but to live.

In 2008, around the time we discovered it, the fort, run by the nonprofit Fort Ticonderoga Association, faced serious financial problems. It had lost a major benefactor, and there was political infighting and expensive construction on an education center. A new president, Beth Hill, came on board in 2010, and she expanded the public offerings to appeal to a broader range of visitors, including people like me who weren’t so interested in battles. In addition to the regular re-enactments, there are now canoe tours, walking tours, exploration tours, fife and drum concerts, seminars, authors’ series, tailoring workshops to make your own military coat, evening ghost tours and living-history weekends every month of the winter.

“You have visitors coming who are fascinated by the fashion of the era or the tools or the trades of the period,” Ms. Hill said in an interview. “People love it here not only for the historical significance, but because of the natural beauty. James Madison and Thomas Jefferson came here as tourists.”