Road Trip to DC

Have you ever noticed that in the west (California) people call Washington D.C. "D.C." and here in the east (Ohio) they call it "Washington"?  I guess it's because here in the East going to Washington state is so far away, they can't imagine actually doing it, and vice versa in the West.

 I just noticed that.

We took a little jaunt to our nation's capital on New Year's Day.   Here are some highlights of the trip:

We had a little tour of the Capitol building.  Here we are standing in front of "Freedom" , a replica of the statue that's on the top of the rotunda.  It's huge.

They gave us headphones so that we could listen to the tour guide.  For some people, that provided more entertainment than the tour itself.  Calvin would try to get close to the guide and then speak loudly to see if he could hear himself in his own headphones.  Which meant that everyone else could too.

Here are my lovelies sitting at the edge of the reflecting pool looking towards the Lincoln Memorial.  I wonder if in the summer, when the reflecting pool isn't frozen, if there are dead mucky leaves and discarded water bottles in it.  I'm sure not.

It was cold outside.  If you've ever been to D.C., or Washington, whatever you want to call it, you'll know that there is a lot of walking to do.  We walked down the Mall to the Air and Space Museum, amidst much begging for a taxi.

Here they are in front of the LEM, or landing module, for the Apollo moon missions.  Not the actual one, that one is still on the sound stage that they filmed the moon landing on.

More walking.  This time to the Natural History Museum, which was like a zoo.  No pun intended.  There were hosts of people there.  I don't like crowds.  Calvin and I sat down and had a little foot massage.  Or at least he did.  Then we saw the gems and rocks, which were not that popular of an exhibit, which was fine with me.  But guess what we found!

  Okay I'll tell you.  

It's a mineral called "Benitoite".

Guess why it's called "Benitoite."

Cuz it was discovered in San Benito County, California, that's why!

By this time it was dark and colder, but we were close-ish to the Washington Monument, so we stopped by.  

It's huge and very impressive.

And the lights are fun to play in.

Then we DID get a taxi, went to Chinatown, and had Chinese food.  Yum!  Then it was back to the hotel for swimming, the part of the day the boys had been waiting for!

Calvin has grown a bit.

Next day, up and at em, we head to the World War II memorial, which is new and also cool.  There is a pillar for every state, so we took pictures of the kids in front of the pillar of the state they were born in, and then we all took one in front of our new home state.

Next, on to the Vietnam War Memorial, and then the Lincoln Memorial.  It's big.  Very big.  Jack is trying to "hold" Abraham Lincoln in his hand, but I don't think he understands about depth of field.  Neither do I, come to think of it.

Off again, this time to Arlington National Cemetery.  That place is huge!  Here we saw President Kennedy's grave (did you know that he had 2 children that died as babies?)  This is the flame that is never to go out.

We then saw the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.  We got to see them changing guards, which is very solemn and cool, (Calvin kept kicking his feet together like they do, he was spellbound)  Later on he was telling me how much he liked it, and he said, "It was so cool, when I grow up I want to be a soldie..........mmm, no I don't."

Throwing gang signs at Arlington.  Yeah.

We still had a few hours to kill, so we went to the American History museum, which had a lot of cool stuff in it.  We saw the original Star Spangled Banner which Francis Scott Key saw flying over the fort in the War of 1812 and then wrote the song about.  It was humongous, and in a very dark room, because it's so old and the light speeds up the decay of the fibers.  So, of course they wouldn't let us take pictures.  We also saw the Gettysburg Address written in Abraham Lincoln's own handwriting.  Very cool.

Jack got to hold a real Civil War gun.

Here's my boys pretending to get run over by a train.

Tired and hungry, we took a taxi to the downtown area where eateries are located, and had McDonald's standing up with bums asking for money as we threw our trash away.  That part sucked.

Then off to swim some more.  It was cold, and our feet were tired, but it was a truly memorable experience.  We are so blessed to live in this great nation!