One thing we noticed right away in D.C. was that Southern Hospitality had abruptly come to an end! Our capitol is not the friendliest place, but that’s okay because there is so much to do! We wish we had scheduled more time, but still saw quite a bit over the two days we were there!
In major cities like this, we generally have to stay at an RV park an hour or so away from downtown and get there via public transportation. For D.C., we stayed in Maryland, took an Uber to the nearest train station, and then rode the subway in the rest of the way and it worked well! The subway tunnels there reminded us of Star Wars rides at Disneyland!
A few days after we left, they were hit with big storms and flash flooding and these same tunnels had water streaming in! Glad we missed that!
Some of our first stops were the Navy Memorial and the Capitol Building. We were able to do a tour up into the rotunda and eat in the cafeteria. I thought it was funny that they were out of toilet paper, soap, forks, you name it at the Capitol. C’mon people, where are my tax dollars going? (JK) It was still a really cool experience to be in that important building!
Each state has two statues that represent them in the capitol and “What the heck Utah?!” They stole Philo T. Farnsworth, who was clearly from my hometown of Rigby, ID and our only claim to fame. Not cool Utah!
One of the best things about Washington is the plethora of Smithsonian Museums! There are 19 of them and they are all free! I didn’t know or expect that before this trip, so that was a great surprise! We only had time for two, the Museum of American History and Museum of Natural History. We especially enjoyed the American History Museum. They have pop culture items like the ruby slippers from Wizard of Oz and one of the Batmobiles, and an amazing collection of historic artifacts. A couple of our favorites were probably the original Star-Spangled Banner Flag – it was giant and so cool to see in person (but we couldn’t take pictures) and Abraham Lincoln’s hat.
The natural history museum was super cool too, in fact, I ran into one of my relatives there! The kids liked seeing skeletons of a lot of different animals and the Hope Diamond.
One of the other D.C. highlights was seeing so many cool monuments. A friend suggested we see them at night and I’m so glad we did. They were so pretty!
We also went to Arlington National Cemetery. It’s a beautiful place and it was interesting to see JFK’s grave and the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We are very grateful for the brave patriots who are buried there!
Last, but not least we visited 1600 Pennsylvania Ave!
We were all worn out after our adventures in D.C.!
Okay THATS IT Utah!! Philo was from RIGBY LIKE ME. utah educated me but I’m from Idaho. Yeesh!
This looks so fun!! And I was laughing so hard at your relative. Doesn’t look like you tho
I love the monuments at night! They glow and are a beacon of freedom lighting the world. My heart swells with pride when I see them anytime, but especially at night.
The Museum of American History is our favorite! It never disappoints. It takes a lot of time to go through it. I love the train engine downstairs. It is so huge. We love the Museum of Natural History also. We have tried to get through all of them. They keep adding more.
It is so tiring to walk the National Mall. The sleeping pictures bring it all back to me. The girls are SO cute. The love is oozing out.