When Claire sees the news about the Boston Tea Party, she acts surprised and as if the crisis was just beginning. By 1773 the imperial crisis had been ongoing for almost a decade. The colonists had been organizing against British laws since the late 1760s, and the Boston Massacre happened three years earlier.
The episode seems to take place in late fall, with some of the trees having leaves on them, and characters relatively lightly dressed. The Boston Tea Party, which Claire and Jamie hear about at the end of the episode, occurred in mid December 1773, and word reached the Carolinas in January 1774.