On May 8th I flew out for my first visit to our nation's capital-- Washington, DC! A good friend, Jenny (aka "G"), was getting married over the weekend, but I thought I would take the opportunity to explore DC for a few days.
I arrived on Tuesday night, and Tom (a friend I made traveling in Thailand) picked me up from DCA, which is right near downtown DC. He wanted to show me a bit of DC at night, so we went to Old Ebbitt Grill, which was a cool, old restaurant. While we waited a short while for our table, we walked a few blocks down to see the White House and the Old Executive Building lit up at night.
 |
| White House at Night |
 |
| Old Exectutive Building |
On Wednesday, we headed out for a long day of DC site seeing! We took the metro from Arlington, where Tom lives. The first stop on our tour was the Washington Monument. I was impressed with how tall it actually is! From there, we started a big loop, which included (hopefully in order): the WWII Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial, the George Mason Memorial, the FDR Memorial, the MLK Memorial, the Korean War Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam Memorial, and finally the White House. My favorite was the FDR Memorial! This took us all morning and we were more than ready for some lucnh!
 |
| Washington Memorial |
 |
| WWII Memorial |
 |
| On Our Walk to the Jefferson Memorial |
 |
| George Mason Memorial-- just begging for an imitation photo (I took another with his actual pose) |
 |
| One of many poses with statues during the day |
 |
| Artistic Photo of the Day- Viet Nam Memorial |
 |
| Lincoln Memorial |
 |
| Interior of the Old Post Office |
Tom took me to the Old Post Office, which was a really impressive building. They have a food court on the bottom floor, so we grabbed a quick bite before continuing the tour. Next stop was the tower of the Old Post Office. It was free to ride to the top and there was a great view from up there. You could spot most of the monuments and memorials.
Next up on the tour was the Air and Space Smithsonian Museum. I knew I would only have time for about two Smithsonians, and this was my first choice. Seeing all the planes, rockets, and space shuttles was really cool!
 |
| First Airplane |
 |
| Air & Spance Museum |
The day didn't end there though. I wanted to see the Georgetown area, since a few different people recommended it to me. We decided it would be a good place to meet up with Kelly and Pablo who had flown in from Spain for the wedding. We got apps and beers at a local bar, and Kelly shared some VERY exciting news with me (let's just say she wasn't drinking beer with us at the bar). It was so great to see her and I nearly cried (happy tears) when I heard the news :) Kelly and Pablo were jet lagged and Tom had made some plans with his friends to watch the playoff hockey game at a bar near his house. So we parted ways with Kelly and Pabs, and headed back to Arlington to finish the night. Wow, what a day!
