L'Enfant Plaza Hotel
Our first year wedding anniversary was 23 June 2008, but it was a Monday and I had to work…no getting out of it. So as soon as I got out of work at 7:00 pm, I headed straight home to change clothes for our evening out.
Ok, I know the title of this is “A Day in Washington D.C.”, but I’m getting to it. Be patient!
I was greeted at the front door by my beautiful wife who was already dressed in a sexy little black dress. We decided to exchange gifts after we returned home, so I quickly changed, and off to downtown Annapolis and our favorite Italian restaurant, Maria’s.
After a great dinner (see review) we headed back home to finish the night.
Smithsonian Castle
Now our trip to Washington D.C.
Tuesday 24 June 2008.
It was a regular day off of work for me, and Lena took the day off so we could spend it together. After breakfast, and a bit of milling about the house (mostly me on the TravBuddy site J) we drove to the closest Metro (subway) stop to our house which is about 20 minutes away, and that’s driving 70 to 75 miles per hour! I wish this state would look at other cities or countries and get a clue on how a subway/train system should work. It’s great if you live in the Washington Metropolitan area, but anywhere outside the city you have to drive a while to get to a stop.
National Museum of the American Indian.
But it’s still better than driving all the way into D.C. and trying to park. So we get to the station, get our tickets, and we’re off to Washington D.C.
About 30 minutes later, we get off at the L'Enfant Plaza stop and grab a sandwich for lunch. There are a lot of little restaurants and shops at this plaza, so finding something was simple. There is also a L'Enfant Plaza Hotel formerly the Loews L'Enfant Plaza Hotel at this stop. So, needing a street map, we wondered in to the hotel lobby, and I went up to the concierge’s desk pretending to be a guest and asked for a local street map and directions. With that done, we made our way outside and off to our first stop. Lena is a lover of books and libraries, so our first planned stop was the Library of Congress.
On the way to the Library of Congress, we walked past the Smithsonian Castle, the Hirshhorn Museum, the Air& Space Museum, and the National Museum of the American Indian.
The dome of the U.S. Capital Building.
This is a new museum and we had never seen it before, so we made this our first stop.
I’ll describe the museum in detail in the review, but in short, this is a great museum to visit. Full of information on the Native American’s both past and present. This is a must see place to visit.
Our next stop was the Library of Congress. Continuing our walk down Independence Avenue, we went past the U.S. Botanic Gardens and the U.S. Capital. Finally we made it to our destination. I guess we could have picked a closer Metro stop to get off at, but the weather was great, so the walk was nice and we would have missed the National Museum of the American Indian. There are actually three separate buildings that make up the Library of Congress. We visited the Jefferson Building hoping to see lots of cool old books stacked on shelves floor to ceiling, but this was not the case.
National Museum of the American Indian.
Maybe if we would have taken one of the tours through the building, we would have seen more, but this is a very large building and you only have access to a very small section of it. The building itself is very impressive with all the detail in the architecture, and inside the actual Thomas Jefferson book collection was very cool to see. If you’re into bibles, and we are not, the Gutenberg Bible and the Giant Bible of Mainz are on display here as well.
After leaving the Library of Congress, we decided to walk down Constitution Avenue and head towards the National Archives Building to see the Declaration of Independents and other historical documents on display there. Lena had never seen them and I was very young the first and last time I was there.
In route to the National Archives Building, we walked past the Supreme Court Building, then through a little park with a fountain where Lena took off her shoes and walked through the water, after I made sure no police were around, then past the U.
National Museum of the American Indian.
S. Court House, and the National Gallery of Art.
There was a small line to get in, but the wait was short and we were soon inside waiting our turn to access The Rotunda where the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the Declaration of Independence are displayed. Since no flash photography is allowed, my pictures are a bit dark. There is more to see here than just the documents listed above, but it was getting late and we were craving some ice cream.
We continued down Constitution Avenue past the National Museum of Natural History and made our way to the Old Post Office Pavilion. Inside the Old Post Office, there is a large center court with shops and a few food stands, one of which was a Ben & Jerry’s. Lena ordered a Chunky Monkey (Banana Ice Cream with Fudge Chunks & Walnuts) and I got a Half Baked (A crazy concoction of chocolate and vanilla ice cream mixed with fudge brownies and gobs of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough)
After finishing off the yummy ice cream, it was time to head to the nearest Metro station and get back home.
The ceiling over the center display in the National Museum of the American Indian.
It was a good day out, even though our main quest wasn’t what we expected, the unplanned stops were very good.
If you have never been to D.C., make sure you know what sites or museums you want to see, because you’ll never do it in a day. For me, one day of museums is enough. I can’t do two or three days in a row, so you’ll have to make a second, third, fourth and even a fifth trip to see it all. If I’m showing you around, we’ll have to mix it up between the beach and the city, but we’ll be happy to have you stay with us and show you the sites.
Safe travels to you all!!
