Day 12 - Pentagon and beyond

We set off for the Pentagon and the tour we had booked online.  You aren't allowed to take photos of the building so we've downloaded a photo from the internet to show you how massive it is (it's the world's largest low-rise office building).

The only place inside where we could take photos was in the waiting area for the tour to start.  Rhonda gave a very impressive speech calling for world peace, until she realised that world peace would make the Pentagon redundant.  A member of the honour guard came to take her away.

The tour was excellent, and bizarre.  We had two guides, who swapped roles halfway through.  The guides walk backwards while conducting the tour, something they have to practice for.  It's so they can keep their tour groups in sight the whole time.  The building is very impressive - it has 7,754 windows (the guides said that everybody remembers that statistic) which stop people spying from outside the building and are bullet proof.  The inside memorial to the 59 victims from the plane that crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11, and the 125 workers from the Pentagon was small but moving.  

After the Pentagon we moved on to the National Cemetery at Arlington.  It contains over 400,000 graves and they still bury between 25 and 35 bodies a day.  We took a bus tour of the cemetery and spent time at the gravesite of John F. Kennedy (Jacqui is buried next to him, and two children, one either side) and then the site of the tomb of the unknown soldiers (one each from WW1, WW2 and the Korean War- there was a fourth 'unknown', from the Vietnam War, but he was identified by DNA recently).

The JRK gravesite

JFK again

A wreath for Australia, outside the tomb of the unknown soldiers, laid that morning by Bill Shorten during a visit

Saluting the Australian wreath during the ceremony for the changing of the guard

Graves, graves and more graves

A beautiful rose in the gardens at Arlington

We enjoyed our time at Arlington, in a sad and reflective way, but were impressed by the experience.  Next stop was the Lincoln Memorial, about a half hour's walk away.  It is impressive during the daylight, and even more impressive at night.  Some daylight shots are below.

The back of the Lincoln Memorial

Lincoln was huge!

The view from the side of the Lincoln Memorial, down the National Mall to the Capitol (which is about 3.5 kilometres away)

We went back to the National Mall in the evening to take some twilight shots, shown below.

We saw a squirrel on our way to the National Mall - the little varmints are everywhere (everywhere there are trees and grass)

Fountains at the WW2 Memorial

The WW2 Memorial again

The Lincoln Memorial

Lincoln as the lights come on

Washington is beautiful when the lights are on

By the time we got back to the hotel it was quite late, and our legs hated us.  I must say we are sleeping very well here.  No signs for today, but a general comment on signage - it's rubbish.  It shouldn't be difficult to know where you're going, but it often is.  Tomorrow we're booked in for a tour of the Capitol building.  'Bye for now.

Day 11 - A tale of two museums

Another day in Washington and the plan is to visit a couple of the museums along the National Mall.  Rhonda has developed the habit of getting a good coffee (from the local café with the huge mugs) before we head out.  Going there involves her walking past a McDonalds and today she encountered a homeless man, asking for money for breakfast.  Being the person she is she took him in to McDonalds and bought him what he wanted - pancakes and soda.  Not a healthy start, but if it brought him some pleasure that helps.  There are a noticeable number of homeless people here, mostly middle aged men.  They seem to favour the parks, which can be a bit confronting.

We've chosen the National Air and Space Museum and the National Gallery of Art.  We started with a short subway ride to a point near the museums and then walked the short distance to the National Mall.  Beside the Air and Space Museum Rhonda noticed a 'temporary' McDonalds (I guess because they can).

We visited the Air and Space Museum first, and I have to say it is awesome - boy toy heaven.  The museum is quite big, and is crammed with aircraft and spacecraft exhibits.  It also features a large IMAX theatre (we watched the feature "The Hidden Universe") which shows four features throughout the day.  A few happy snaps are below.



Rockets

Lunar Landing Module

Aircraft

One really cute thing we saw was an 'emotional support dog' with one of the visitors.  It looked very similar to the photo below (downloaded from the internet),but the dog we saw was a Jack Russell.  Very cute and obviously a source of comfort for its owner.

Then it was on to the National Gallery of Art.  It is located across the National Mall from the Air and Space Museum.  You get a great view of the Capitol building from the mall.

A zoomed-in shot of the Capitol

The National Gallery of Art is spread across two buildings.  The first is typical of many public buildings in Washington - large and featuring lots of Greek or Roman columns.  The second is more modern and appears to be channelling the entrance to the Louvre.

The inside of the older building is very 'Pantheon' like, with a big domed ceiling in the middle.

We joined a guided tour featuring Italian Renaissance art.  The guide was very knowledgeable and made it a very interesting and informative experience.

That's a Leonardo da Vinci painting

Without the guide the area would have been far less interesting - far too many variations of 'Madonna and Child'.  After the tour we wandered around by ourselves and the collection is magnificent.  The different galleries are themed on national lines, and we particularly enjoyed the French impressionists, the Dutch masters and the British landscapes (including Constables and Turners).  One of Rhonda's favourites is below, followed by one of mine.

A Monet - his garden (which we visited last year)

A Turner

Near each end of the main building was a small indoor garden - very tranquil but lacking in high tea - they would have been fantastic settings but we understand that they have to be careful with food and drink in the gallery.

After the museums we went back to the supermarket for supplies, and bought fresh sourdough bread, cheese and salad for dinner.  Another tiring but enjoyable day.  Today's sign was spotted by Rhonda.  It's good to see that they are encouraging environmental responsibility.

Tomorrow we're visiting the pentagon and the Arlington national Cemetery.  Hope everybody reading this is happy and healthy.  Love R & R.

Day 10 - Touch and go

Our first whole day in Washington and we decided to get some retail therapy and check out the sights.  In the morning we went to our local Metro station to find out how the system works.  We were totally confused - the ticket machines are not intuitive and the whole setup was difficult to understand.  Luckily for us, Clark came to the rescue.  He was the station manager and showed us how to get Metro Cards, and then explained how to use the Metro.  He had a great sense of humour and had us dancing through the entry gates, after touching our Metro cards to the sensors - as Clark said (while dancing): "You got to touch, and go, touch, and go".  A lovely person who really made our morning (we sent in a feedback form later complimenting him on a job very well done).  The Metro in Washington is totally different from the one in New York, as you can see from the two shots below.

New York subway station

Washington subway station

We took the subway to Pentagon City, one stop away from where we have to go on Monday.  Pentagon City is a large shopping centre, and a good place for some retail therapy.  Rhonda bought shoes, which were a very good price compared to Australia.  I got a pair of shoes also, but the best buy for me was a replacement head for my electric shaver: $95 in Australia, $45 here (somebody in Australian retail is getting rich at our expense).

Pentagon City

After the therapy we went back to the hotel, dropped off the bags and went out to walk around the local area.  We took in the White House (300 metres from the hotel) and walked down Pennsylvania Avenue, where we saw lots of the US Government Departments.  Washington is like Canberra, but on steroids.

White House from the front

White House from the back

The Capitol

Department of Commerce building

Gratuitous photo of buildings

Ornate doors - just in case you were wondering

Another impressive building

Two old guys who sat in the same spot for too long



Rhonda taking a photo of the J. Edgar Hoover Building

Finally, and perhaps an indication that I'm overthinking signs, here's one that caught my eye.

I get the 'cold drinks', but surely 'ice cold water', if it really is as cold as ice, is just 'ice'.  That's all for now, tomorrow we're visiting the Air and Space Museum and the National Gallery.

Day 9 - From the rediculous to the sublime

We left New York with mixed feelings.  Our experiences of the Big Apple were wonderful, and we are so glad we had a week there.  Some random thoughts/impressions of our stay are:

• Friendly people - every time we opened a map someone would ask if we needed help.  New Yorkers were very helpful.
• Huge buildings - the skyscrapers of Manhattan are gigantic.  I'm sure they are much bigger (higher and wider) than skyscrapers in Australia.  They look 'normal' from a distance, but when you are close to them they are truly awe inspiring.
• Smells - walking along streets brought us moments of mouth-watering food smells and nose-scrunching sewer smells.  There were food trucks/carts everywhere and casual eating is very common.
• Starbucks are everywhere - either a good thing or a bad thing depending on your personal preferences. 
• Diversity - New York was full of tourists from all over the world (as opposed to tourists from one part of the world), and filled with diverse districts, each of which had their own character.

We left the hotel in plenty of time for the short taxi ride to Pennsylvania Station to catch our train to Washingtown.  The taxi driver was a dickhead.  He took us to Grand Central Station, and when I challenged him about his route he told us that he had to take a round-about route because of traffic restrictions.  Complete crap.  Thankfully we still got to Pennsylvania Station in time to wait with the seething mass of humanity for platform numbers to be allocated.  Everybody waited in the main hall, watching a large screen which listed the trains.  The platform numbers were only allocated about 10 minutes before departure time, at which point all of the passengers for that train would rush away to their platform.  Our trip to the platform involved taking our cases and bags down an escalator, along poorly signposted passageways, and down staircases.  We figure that the Airlines own the trains and run them badly to ensure that people will still fly to most places.  Having said that, the train was comfortable (we went cattle class) and the scenery along the route was very interesting.

We got seats at the back of the carriage, which had extra leg room.  The train was still underground at this stage, so no view.

Gratuitous scenery during the train trip.

While on our journey we met a lovely lady from San Francisco, Corrinne, who wrote down many suggestions for our time to come (25 July to 2 August) in San Francisco.  After what seemed like nearly four hours, but was in fact only about 240 minutes, we arrived at Union Station in Washingtown.

The front entrance to Union Station - unfortunately the interior wasn't so grand.

A short, and very direct, taxi ride later we were at our lodgings.  What a contrast with New York, we've gone from the ridiculous (our room in New York was about 23 square metres in total) to the sublime (an 81 square metre apartment for about the same price).

The AKA White House exterior.

It's amazing.  My only gripe is that the television in the bedroom is smaller than the one in the living room!  If any of you are thinking about visiting Washingtown you should check this place out.  We went out shortly after arriving and had a cuppa at a local coffee shop.  Their mugs are huge, mine below is a medium size.

We then went for a walk to the nearest supermarket to buy groceries.  It was about 1.8 kilometres away, but a pleasant walk.  During the walk I noticed a refreshingly honest badge on a car.

The supermarket was very impressive.  It featured a huge fresh salad and hot food area for people who wanted to buy a meal along with their groceries.

We arrived back at the hotel feeling quite tired, but excited about seeing more of Washingtown (Rhonda did two loads of washing).  We received confirmation of our tour of the Pentagon for Monday, so tomorrow we'll check out the Metro, to make sure we know how to get there, and start sightseeing.