Spontaneous Washington D.C

After the tragic loss of Stanley, and seeing that I was only about an hour away from D.C. I decided that I would cruise over and spend the afternoon in our nation's capitol. As I was approaching the city I got nervous about where to park and such, luckily there were big signs indicating how to get to the Metro. I followed the signs and ended up at the Shady Grove station which is the end of the line. It was about a 30 minute ride on the train which became the subway as it got closer to D.C.

I got off right behind the National Archives. The archives are right by the end of the National Mall.
It was a beautiful, hot April day. I had two choices on how to go about my afternoon. I could pick just a few things to really explore, or I could try to see as much as possible in my short time. I was feeling good, so I went the ambitious route. Here is my trip:

Note: my pictures aren't that great as I more focused on using my video camera. Plus, I was alone so no one familiar is in the pictures. I tried to take some pics of myself, but my giant cranium kept blocking out all the monuments. Also, Make sure to click the links within the text. They go to some better pictures of things my camera didn't work so well on.

1. First I went down to the Capitol building. Lots of steps, met Bill.

2. Went into the Botanical Gardens (which was free, just like all the other stuff, which ROCKS!!) Went in to use the bathroom, stayed to check out some of the cool plants in the medicinal plant section, will definitely drag Sandy back here.

3. Went down a couple buildings to the Smithsonian's Air and Space section. Another place to go back to( gonna stop saying that, cuz I'm gonna go back to all of 'em). Was really cool to see the Spirit of St. Louis, and other famous aircraft. They have some of the real re-entry vehicles from space mission. It was neat to look at the burnt tiles from coming through the atmosphere and know that this thing was really in outer space. Saw Sputnik, our hamster's namesake. The coolest thing I saw was called Aerogel. Its the least dense solid material ever. They had a chunk of it, and it looked like a cube shaped fog. It was bizarre. It looked like it would be really fragile and that your fingers would go into it like it was made of steam, but apparently it is rigid and really strong. I would have probably paid 10 bucks just for the opportunity to handle the stuff and see what it really feels like.

4. I then walked down to the Natural History section of the Smithsonian. Didn't stay long, but I checked out an orchid display that was going to be gone soon. There were a ton of really neat orchids. There was also a surprise in the gem section. I didn't know it, but a lot of famous gems are on display, including the Hope Diamond, and other gigantic gems owned by royalty.

5. I spent the rest of the day walking to all the monuments. I must say they are way bigger than I thought. Especially the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials. The Jefferson causes an illusion where it looks a lot closer than it really is. Two cool things were the Korean War monument and the FDR park. The Korean War monument is just a group of statues that look like soldiers walking through the jungle. It really captures the emotion of war. The Franklin D. Roosevelt park is neat, it has a bunch of really geometric shaped waterfalls and statues of FDR and scenes from the depression and stuff.

6. It was almost dark and I had to get home, so I walked over and saw the Whitehouse last. It was cool. Then I caught the train and drove home. Coming home was its own adventure, because I needed to get on Highway 11, which goes through Danville. Well, like every exit for 20 miles says it exits on to 11. But you can't just get off and drive 11 unless you want to head out of the way and drive through Harrisburg. I was getting really frustrated, but eventually found the right exit to get home somewhat efficiently.

Well, thanks for reading about my adventures this week.