Moving on from Philly, the first new state was Delaware, which always makes me think of Wayne's World: "Hi, I'm in Delaware..." We chose the Delmarva peninsula route, rather than the Baltimore route, and crossed a long bridge over the Chesapeake Bay.
We reached our hotel in Crystal City (Arlington), VA in the late afternoon and pretty much crashed for the night. The next morning, we had a slow breakfast at the hotel and then headed to the metro to get to the National Mall in Washington, DC. The kids were very excited about riding the subway!!
We decided to start with the museums, so we crossed to the Natural History Museum to get started. I had never been to that one, so I was kind of excited, too! We perused the exhibits (mostly mammals and ocean) for a few hours and then found a food court in the Reagan building for a quick lunch before we collapsed.
After our late lunch, we used the Metro again to get closer to the Capitol, but we had a few minutes to kill before our capitol tour check-in, so we strolled up the block and saw the Supreme Court
and Neptune's Fountain outside the Library of Congress. Fancy!
Then we crossed the street to the Capitol Visitor's Center and got bumped up to an earlier tour. The tour only had 3 stops: the dome, crypt, and original House of Reps room, plus an informative video on the building's history, but it was long enough for our family.
I think DC is a little obsessed with George Washington. Did you know that he's at the middle of the dome's mural up top, too? I never noticed that before.
Upon our exit from the capitol, we noticed a tunnel to the Library of Congress and decided to explore the largest library in the world! I was not expecting such a beautiful building, but the Great Hall really reminded me of the ornate architecture we saw in Italy last summer. Pretty neat to mix in some new sites with the old familiar ones.
It was decked out from mosaic floors to delicately painted ceilings.
The general public was not allowed in the Reading Room, but there was an observational balcony to see the spectacular domed room, arched reading stacks, and the central librarian's desk in the middle below.
After we had thoroughly bored the kids with the old and historic (they got surrounded by a tour group when they parked on a bench in the great hall and had to be still, since they were front and center!), it was time to mix it up with some new technology: the Air and Space Museum!
It was staying open late so we still had a few hours to check it out; here's Owen feeling overwhelmed upon entry into the huge museum!
Suffice it to say that there was a lot of walking, reading, pondering, and discussing all sorts of aircraft and spacecraft. Maybe the end of the day wasn't the best time to handle all of that information, but the kids enjoyed it despite their waning energy.
It was starting to rain as we left the museum, so we huddled under our one umbrella and scampered a few blocks to a MYO-noodle bowl place right next to the metro station. Yum!
Then on to our hotel for another solid sleep to do it all again in a few hours. The next morning we started out near the White House.
and made our way to the Washington Monument for lunch. The observation deck inside was closed, but it was still neat to sit near it while we ate our PBJs. At least it was, until it started to rain...
For some reason, we only had the one umbrella again, but we headed for the trees near the WWII monument. By the time we got there, we sort of resigned ourselves to being sticky and wet the rest of the day. It stopped raining, but it must have still been 99% humidity and in the upper 80s. I don't think I've ever felt more humid air!
We tried to be like ducks and let the humidity roll off our backs, but it didn't quite work.
The Lincoln Memorial was calling our name, so onward it was, with a side detour to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall.
Next were some newer memorials for the Korean War and MLK.
We could see the Jefferson Memorial, but it looked so far away!
One more new memorial to walk through on the way: FDR. I liked this one! It gave a bit of history along with some picturesque stone-water vignettes for reflection.
More walking along the Tidal Basin, where evidence of heavy rains from the previous week showed that the basin must have risen above its usual level, and the sidewalk was still flooded in parts, but we made it! The Jefferson Memorial is quite pleasing to the eye, and Jefferson did have a way with words!
Whew, those dogs were howlin' by this point! We were lucky to be under cover when it started to sprinkle again, so we sat on the "porch" and stretched for a bit while we waited for a break in the rain.
So many steps! All the while, hot and muggy and dripping and steaming. We needed some refreshments, so we got some ice cold treats. Can you tell what color Hadley's was?
You'd think that we would be done for the day, but the kids wanted to go back to the Natural History museum to see the butterflies we missed the day before. We still didn't get tickets to the butterfly walk-through, but we saw a working bee hive (a clear tube connected the hive to the outdoors), which was fascinating!
We also ran into a T-Rex... and his fossilized poop!
Phew, finally a wrap on this day. We stopped in Rosslyn to keep with the MYO (make your own) dinner theme (Mediterranean food this time), and I'm pretty sure the Rosslyn station was the longest escalator I've ever been on! (In fact, I looked it up, and it is the second longest continuous escalator in North America at 207 feet!)
Another long, but memorable day done! There was just one last thing we wanted to see before we left DC. Arlington National Cemetery! So eerily beautiful and stunning.
And another hot, steamy morning in our nation's capital. We hoofed it to JFK's memorial not long after it opened, but we were already sweating.
We witnessed the Changing of the Guard ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, as well as the grandeur of the Memorial Amphitheater. Then one more long, hot walk back to the car.
Washington, DC definitely has more than its fair share of beautiful architecture and aesthetic monuments. But our next stop, Williamsburg, has it beat on longevity!
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