Last Day

This day, weather wise was the best. It was 70s most of the day with some cool wind, perfect weather. 

We went back to the mall and looked at all the monuments. There is something humbling about seeing all of them in person. No movie or tv show does them justice. 

White House one this side was packed. Not sure if this is the front or the back. We walked around to the other side, which lead us to the Washington Monument. 

This is the side that I think of when I think of the White House. There was a lot blocked off, so we couldn't get super close. We could get closer than this, I just didn't take a picture there. 

Washington Monument. Very tall and VERY windy right next to it.  

Us and the White House way in the back. 

Notice the flags. The left go one way then slowly start to go the other way. It is so windy right around it, and somehow make the flags go different directions. 

Each state had one of these, and I believe in the order they became a state. 

I really thought the reflecting pool was going to be, well reflective, but it was not, actually pretty dirty. It was only about 8 inches deep, which surprised me as well. 

This is after we walked up the Lincoln Monument. It's so beautiful. 

I knew this was big, but didn't realize exactly how big it really was. 

Next we walked to the Vietnam War Memorial wall. I didn't realize how long it really is. At each end is a book that you can look up your family's name and it will tell you where they were from, when they passed away and where to find their name. This was the most humbling I think. It was so long and just for one war. Even these don't give you a full picture of the reality of it's length. I saw a man with a Vietnam Veteran hat on and wondered how many of these men he knew and served with. 

After we got lunch. I will say that each place we tried was really good. We tried new places for each meal and  found some delicious places. 

We had about a half hour before our next appointment so we went to the Old Post Office Tower. It was a post office for a while then Trump bought it and either made it a hotel or it was a hotel as well. But this section had to stay open to the public. While the government owns it now, this section just opened up very recently.  The tower allow you a good view of the city. Very windy and blocked by these wires. 

Next was the Ford Theater. Almost all places here are free, you just have to have timed tickets. I didn't expect to like this as much as I did. It's fun to see these old buildings that have so much meaning in-between all of these modern high buildings. 

The night he was shot, there were 1700 people in attendance. Today they still do plays and other shows here and 650 is the max they allow in. So it was packed. 

This is where he and his wife were sitting when Booth came up and shot him, timed with a joke he knew was coming in the play that night. He knew the audience would laugh and possible cover the sound of the gun. This happened about 10 pm that night. 

The size of the gun used and the size of the single bullet. 

After he was shot he was taken to this house to be treated. 

This was the room he was in and about 730 am the next morning he passed away. I did not realize he was alive for so long after being shot.  The rest of this museum went to a building next door. It had replicas of his casket, a few things off the actual one, an area showing how they finally got Booth and his accomplices and other facts. 

This is a tower, that wrapped all around, all are books written about President Lincoln. We were on the 5th floor of the building. One mans legacy lead to this many books!

One including a guest appearance in Spider-Man. 

Our last dinner was at a place called Famers and Distillers. They make everything fresh and you could tell. It all was so good and you could tell it was fresh. Today we did over 8 miles of walking. A lot of walking over the week, but fully worth it all. I'd do it again in a heartbeat, just maybe in a cooler time of the year. 

The next morning we got up at 4:30 am and took off for home. We flew the same path home as we did out. This time we could see Mount Rainier. at 10,000 feet in a plane you can have your devices out, the mountain was still taller than where we were at when that happened. It looks like a small mountain with lots of snow, but its clouds. 

The end of the trip was a treat too, but as bad as the beginning, but 3 of our bags were left in Seattle and didn't get on our flight. There was a later flight coming in that they were put on and the airline delivered them to Paul's house. It has been a while since Brad and I took a trip alone and this was so much fun. It was something different than we would have thought on our own, but we loved it. Good company, food and sites to see. 

I was semi nervous to leave the kids. While they are older, it's weird that first time leaving. Not only leaving over night but we were one the opposite side of the country. The three boys were at our house, and Emery went to Jayson's. I think that ended up being the best arrangement that could have happened. The day we left was Zander's birthday, so all the boys hung out all day. This was the picture we got from their time together. 

Thursday my friend Abby had an appointment in town and picked the boys up for lunch. It was nice to have someone check on them. They loved going out to lunch with her as well. 

Because Blogger didn't want to place this where I wanted, This is the Washington Monument, it is really tall. 

Since everyone did so well this trip, I think it's time for Brad and I to start planning our next one. 

Washington DC Day 3

One thing I forgot about the capital dome tour on the last post was how hard it actually is to get. You can get tickets to tour just the capital. They are sold out for a while, but are free and anyone can get. I said that you have to have a representative with you to do them, but they only allow 7 per group and only do 7 a day. These tours recently started up again, which Paul has been working since probably January to get us a tour. We were lucky to get the day we did because the next tour opening was about 2 months away. 

Day 2 was less walking but I think just as hard. By mid-day the temp was high 90s but felt like 102! And it felt like 102 with humidity. I am not a fan of feeling wet all day, and unless you were in AC, you just felt wet. Thankfully, I mentally prepared myself that my hair would be up the whole trip. 

We started a little later and went to a Market. We thought it would have stands of craft or things people had made, but ended up only being food. But time was not waisted, we went to Captain Cookie for a breakfast of cookies. This was our ice cream sandwich. It was really good but we did not finish it. Anything cold was good this whole trip. I don't really ever eat ice cream, but this was the best I've had all year (the first I've had all year). 

From there we went to the Natural History Museum. We did one floor in about 1.5 hours, and that was us walking decently quick too. We had an appointment for our next museum, so didn't finish it. I really don't know how long you would have to stay to do all of it. 

They had taxidermy animals, sea creature and dinosaurs of all kinds all over. There were some of the first men, women and babies. The fossil parts were fascinating. Seeing how big people used to be, about 5 ft 5inch was an average male and 5 ft 2 inch for women. Not sure what happened in evolution that made it so we needed to be taller.

This area they call the mall. I'm not going to lie, the whole time Paul kept saying this, I thought we were going to see stores as well. We didn't go to the monument today because we had plans to go the next day. Yes, my face always is red and wet looking.  

Next was the Spy Museum. It is one of the few you have to pay to do, but worth it. When you go  you get a key card and with that get a secret identity, location and occupation. Then as you walk through there are other stations to stop at and solve problems. I had to make something to secretly take a picture to get intel, solve a puzzle,  solve the spots where people could be watching you, like hidden cameras, make a costume to blend in your area then you were given a secret location to find on the last floor. There you put your key card and were given a pass code to finish your mission. We all passed...except Brad. He kept reading mine and thinking his were the same went for it. He did not find his secret location. If we ever go back, we'll stop here for sure again. 

Some lethal weapons, including a glove-gun, lip stick pistol, pens.

Next few are ways that intel was passed between places. The one that goes into the male sack was my favorite, sadly it was not used in the field. 

You could climb through a vent duct if you wanted. After the close space of the dome, I was not in any rush to be claustrophobic again. Paul and Michelle did it though. 

My disguise was 83% blended in. It was pure luck. This was one I didn't fully read. You were given a picture that you had to blend into. I didn't realize that and just got lucky.

Brad looked at the picture and did pretty well. 

After this we went back to the house and waited for...

Mom and Dad! They were able to drive up from Boone to spend a few days with us. It's been about 3 months since they left, and it was so good to see them. We went to Union Station for Dinner, they had a bunch of different places to try and spent that night just catching up. Today we did 6.5 miles. I did eat every meal today and felt much better at the end of the day. I did also learn I will never live in a place that has humidity. I'll take dry Idaho heat any day. 

Washington DC Day 1 & 2

A while ago Paul wanted to set up an adult trip. No where in mind, just a get away. He had points to use and we were in. We ended up on Washington DC. This past week the time came. We left the kids home, which I was nervous for, but it was a blast. The kids did great and we loved touring DC. 

The trip had a rocky start for me. Our flight out was early and we got up about 3:45 am to get ready. Beckham was dropping us off and I told Paul I'd text on my way over. I went to text and my pass code didn't work. I figured I was tired so I tried again, and again, and yet again. It came up with a message that I had 11 more tires and then my phone would automatically re-set to factory settings. I even had Brad put the pass code in, didn't work. I used my phone just the night before, used the pass code but it wasn't working. Since I got the code wrong, it would not let me use face or my finger print. I'm a nervous flyer. Not really bad, just the first flight is the hardest for me. Then add on leaving the kids for the first time ever alone AND now my phone was messed up. Needless to say I was on the bring of tears all morning not knowing what to do. The thought of not being able to text the kids to hear how they are, or as dumb as it is, no way to take pictures of our trip.  We do have a cloud that has past pictures on it, and I have an SD card as well, so after a bit of debating in my head we decided to just reset it. This started at 4:30 am and around 7:30 that night I had things almost back to normal. We don't know what happened to my phone. Someone either hacked it somehow or Verizon is messing with me. My phone is just over 2 years old and almost to the day that it was 2 years old I started to have issues. We searched Google and the short story was Verizon doesn't help with these issues.  It was not the best way to start the trip. 

We flew to Seattle then to Baltimore. From there we took a train to Union Station in DC. I will say that I've never been into history a ton when I was in school. This trip has made me appreciate so many things in history. Seeing it in 'real like' is totally worth it. 

Union Station is a big hub for the subway and trains and taxies as well. Most of the buildings we went to were built a long time ago, some finished in the 1800s, but they are amazing. The details and colors of them all. This is Union Station. It was a few blocks away from the house we rented. 

While I would never want to live this close to a neighbor, I did love how they looked. We were in the basement apartment, which was perfect. 

The first day was travel, shopping at a store for snacks and resting up for the next day. 

We got up early to head to the National Zoo. Our first subway ride was packed full of people. 

The zoo was pretty cool. It, like most places, was free. We were there for a few hours walking around. Some animals were very active and others were not, but that's normal. They even had a farm area that just looked like a barn at the fairs in Idaho. Cows, chickens and goats don't scream zoo animal to me. 

Hairless mole rat 

Under the blanket is the male eating his food. He grabbed a snack then the blanket and hid himself while he ate. 

The tiger was hungry or grouchy. He kept letting out a slight roar and walked from side to side of his enclosure. 

Poisonous frogs. 

Cute sting ray, while not nice, they are cute. 

One seal was on one. Not sure what he was doing but he kept barking and we even heard him as we left. 

The front of the zoo; it's so green. There was an area that was called Amazonia. With in that was a rain forest area. When we walked in a bird flew around, didn't do much more. I'm not a fan of birds flying around me like that, but I stayed calm. We were closer to the end and the bird was not happy about that. It let out what sounded like a very loud noise and it flew much closer to Brad and me. I was done and quickly left. 

After we went and got lunch then headed to the Art Museum. It was huge, as all of them are. We saw a lot of cool art, this was my favorite, it's the US Constitution.  

Our next stop was a capital tour. Although ours was a little different. Paul was able to get us a dome tour. Usually you have to go with a congressmen but the one he went thought, Simpson, was out so we were able to go with someone else in his office. Fun fact is both men worked with Charles when Charles worked for Congress. 

This is a layout of some big things in DC, and we walked a lot of it. 

350 ish steps, that's what we did to get to the top of the dome. They are not carpeted, wide, lots of space stairs. They are small, some times claustrophobic, metal stair. 

We walked, about half up and were able to rest and see some sites from here. It already felt so high up and very hot but we were not done. 

We were told a story of the guy who painted the black and white photo that circles the capital  in the picture above. One day while he was working he fell and had to hold the scaffolding to stop from falling all of the way down. It's way too high to be how we were, let alone scaffolding. 

More amazing art that was done years ago. 

The stairs, I'm not great with stairs and these were very nerve-racking. There was a small moment that I was not fully sure I would be able to finish, but we all did. 

And it was worth it. Took me a minute to walk out but the view was breathtaking. This is the Washington Monument. 

This is the building we started at. We took a train underground to the capital. 

From the ground floor. It seems high up not matter how you look at it. 

This is who took us on the tour. 

There are statues all over the capital. All of them are pretty cool. I have no idea who this guy was, just that he looked very square. 

The blue mark shows where we were at from the outside. He said about 250 feet up.

From the capital we went to the Library of Congress. Again, this was finished late 1800s and just look at the artwork. Why can they not build like this today. 

This is the first Bible, and I believe book, made on the first printing press. 

An early map of the world. Notice USA is just a long strip on the left side. They were just a little off with how big it actually was. 

I love books and these were so impressive. They were books from Thomas Jefferson's Library. 

Things I learned today. Not eating enough and getting hot makes me very weak and shaky. After the Capital I had that happen. Not only did I feel dumb for doing it, but scared when it happened. No matter what shoes you have, after 22,000 steps, or 10.5 miles, your feet will kill. And water, lots and lots of water. We did bring a lot of water, which was the one smart thing I did. After this we went to dinner at a really good Italian place and went home to rest for day 3.