Washington, DC

It was nearing the end of summer, and Matt and I decided we wanted to go on a trip. After a lot of discussion, we decided on a trip to the North East. Originally we wanted to go to Maine, but decided that the time constraints were too tight. So, here is what we did on part one of our journey!

Saturday, July 27

We woke and left late for DC. The drive was not all too bad, except it took a lot longer than planned. Rain and traffic put the drive at close to nine hours. When we got to the hotel, we had a few set backs, but got everything settled. We stayed at the Lowes Madison Hotel in downtown. After looking up good places to eat, we walked several blocks to Chinatown to eat at a highly rated pizza place called matchbox. After dinner, we got a few drinks back at the hotel and hit the sack! 

Sunday, July 28

This was our biggest day of walking. After breakfast, we walked to the White House. The weather was overcast and in the 70s, so was very nice. Then we proceeded to walk through all of the monuments on the mall. We saw the Washington (closed because of the earthquake last year), World War II, Lincoln, Korean War, FDR, and Jefferson Memorial. I could not believe how large everything was! It was all very beautiful and moving to see.

The White House

Washington-covered in scaffolding

Lincoln Memorial

Korean War 

Part of the huge FDR memorial

T.J.

Giant Bear Sloth

After this, we met up with my friend, Beth, for lunch. It was great to see her after so many years! Matt and I then walked back to the mall and and went through the Natural History Museum. It was so full of people, but they had some neat things there like dinosaur bones!! We were so tuckered from walking that we headed back to the hotel (I had huge blisters!! We think we walked about 10 miles that day) and ordered Chinese food in for dinner. Late at night, we tried to find an ice cream place, and eventually succeeded. 

Monday, July 29

After packing our bags and taking them down to the car, we had breakfast at the hotel. Soon after, we set out for the Library of Congress. It was a long walk from our hotel, probably about thirty minutes, but the weather was really nice in the low eighties. This was my favorite thing we did in DC, so I wish we had spent more time there. It is absolutely beautiful. The whole building is made of marble and has mosaics all along the ceilings. We could not actually go into the area with all of the books because there were researchers working in there at the time, but it looked amazing. I asked Matt if our library could look like it. There were also two really awesome exhibits we had time to walk through. One was about the civil war, the other about the Americas. Other notable sights: the Gutenberg Bible, Thomas Jefferson's actually library of 5000 books, and a whole series of old maps from the 1400and 1500s. 

Mosaics in the Lib of Congress

Matt and I then needed to head the US Capital building for our tour at noon. We were in a group of about forty and had headphones to hear what our guide was saying. At the beginning we watched a short video about congress, our government, and the building of the capital. I kept thinking about how it would be fun to bring the ninth grade students there to see all of the sights. The best part of the tour was seeing the rotunda, which was beautiful. The other big thing we saw were hundreds of statues, all of important people. 

                                           

                         

The Rotunda in the Capital 

We then went and ate some lunch at a restaurant called Rosa Mexicano. They made the guacamole for us at our table, and it really tasted so delicious. We then hoofed it back to the hotel to get our car and head out. We left later than intended for New Jersey, but still made it in okay time. Two things here: traffic on the Washington-Baltimore freeway was really awful and toll roads are expensive! I really enjoyed DC and already have a list of things to do when I go back!