To the Jefferson Memorial
Couldn't pass this up - Rudloph Evans sculpted the 19 ft statue
Picked this up at the Air and Space Museum Monday. Thought it would be fun to try.
Is he eating it or sniffing it?
It was surprisingly good - doesn't it look good? All the taste of an icecream sandwich without the worry of a melting mess - being as cold as it was we didn't need to worry about that anyway but in the summer...
DC intersections give pedestrians a LOT of time to cross the street. But 92 seconds? This timer is somehow upside down - 56 sounds long too but in DC, that's probaby about right.
Were we really on Route 66? I think we're going to take that drive one day.
The George Washington Monument - flags fly all the way around it - wasn't it a beautiful day?!
If you can't get a whole picture, you might as well give it a big hug (Claire did a lot of hugging of pillars on this trip - we'll have to post the hugs all together sometime) What can we say - she loves our nation's Capitol and all its wonders
Kids - you never know what they'll do - Evan and Claire, to Greg's mortification, rolled down The Hill Cumorah when we were there several years ago - on a Sunday no less in their Sunday clothes! Not much has changed - Claire is doing the worm. When you're excited - you're excited!
The National Museum of Natural History
Evan loved the bones and animals...
In honor of Ryan
There's something coming after this furry guy - can you see it?
These are the skeletons of a man and his dog. I wish I could remember the name of the man but he donated his body to science and this display was made with his and his dog's skeletons and part of the exhibit is a photo of the man and his dog in the same position.
Zebra print is in!
...all things to do with Australia...
The Hall of Geology, Gems and Minerals (wow, wow, wow - this was a very cool exhibit!) Claire took most of her pictures here - it was beautiful. The world is amazing!
An Evan picture - a meteorite
One of Claire's favorites - kind of looks like pink polka dots
The Hope Diamond
There was a special exhibit - Orchids - flowers are so amazing
The Museum of American History
When you first walk in - on the Mall side - there is a huge abstract flag made of metal - unfortunately we didn't get a picture - but in a room behind this big flag is the real Star Spangled Banner - you are not allowed to take pictures of this flag - but it is huge, so much bigger than I ever expected - kept under special lights etc - it was wonderful to see this treasure.
Before we went off to all of the exhibits we decided to grab a bite to eat - there's a nice cafeteria on the bottom floor - a favorite from this meal was a giant cupcake Evan, Claire and I shared.
Evan contributed most of these pictures (there are so many more) he selected these ones to share - such varied exhibits in this museum.
The Ruby Slippers
Lincoln's top hat
This was a fun exhibit having to do with the history of transportation. At this particular spot you could select a segment of "Car Talk" to listen to while standing there.
Done with museums for the day (they all close around 5 or 5:30 in the winter) we headed to the White House. We were sad not to be able to get tickets for a tour inside but we also heard they were very hard to come by the week we were there so we didn't feel too bad.
We thought this was neat because of the planes coming and going - they're the little lights in the distance - they can not fly over the Capitol or the White House, so they make large bank turns to get out of the restricted air space. If you zoom you can see Thomas in his memorial.
We asked a police officer if there was anyway to get closer to the White House and he suggested going to the "back" - a few blocks walk around the area - we are a bit closer. Is this the back or really the front of the White House?
After the White House we started our way back to the Jefferson Memorial by way of the Lincoln Memorial - the Memorials really are something to see at night.
We drove to Union Station - a shopping mall - to get dinner and fix Evan's watch. Union Station began as a train station, and it is still an Amtrak train station but it is also a beautifully refurbished building turned shopping mall. There's a large food court on the bottom level - we ate at Johnny Rocket's.
One of the most amazing things about this day was the amount of ground we covered. Check it out - it is maybe .75 miles from the Jefferson Memorial to the Washington Monument.
http://map.mapnetwork.com/destination/dc/ (pull the page down to see the Jefferson Memorial)
We started at the Jefferson Memorial, went to the Washinton Monument, the Museum of Natural History, the Museum of American History, then onto the White House, to Lincoln Memorial and then back to the Jefferson Memorial
Thus - some of the greatest sights we saw were the lights of our car! after walking back to the free parking lot on Ohio Street.
