Sunday morning we left Kristin’s around 8 so that we could get an early jump on getting to DC and hopefully avoid any horrendous traffic. We succeeded for the most part until we got to Richmond, VA and I-95, at which point it began to rain and traffic was periodically reduced to a crawl for 15 to 20 minutes at a time. After stopping at a rest stop for lunch, which we realized was the first time we had actually used a rest stop on the trip, we continued on to DC, arriving around 5:30.
Once we arrived at Gina’s house in southeast Washington, we set about getting our things into her house and figuring out what we wanted to do with the remaining daylight. We ended up deciding to dive over to the capitol building then walk down the mall to the Lincoln Memorial and back. As it turns out, this was a rather ambitious goal. We walked by the Capitol, down along the lawn to the Washington Monument, and then over to the World War II Memorial before deciding that it was dark enough that we needed to head back. The World War II Memorials, which I can’t believe wasn’t built until 2004, is amazing. It’s an ellipse with the Pacific theater at the one end and the Atlantic theater at the other, a fountain in the middle and a series of quotes and bronze plaques depicting scenes of war. What struck me most were some of the quotes from people like FDR and General Marshall e.g. “our righteous might will win out to absolute victory.” People don’t talk like that anymore. Whatever his flaws, FDR was a badass.
In the morning I went for a run to the capitol, thereby demonstrating to myself how out of shape I am after two weeks without regular exercise, and then got ready to hit the city. We started off with a tour of the Library of Congress. What an amazing building. It now consists of three buildings (Jefferson, Adams and Madison) that comprise the largest library in the world. Actually, just the Madison Building on its own has more books in it than any other. The amount of artwork, mosaics, statues and marble on the interior of the building are astonishing, and the main reading room is absolutely beautiful. National Treasure didn’t do it justice. After our tour we moved on to the Capitol Building for a tour at 12…
Or at least we would have if I had read the fine print on the tickets. There is a tunnel between the Library of Congress and the Capitol, which features another security checkpoint. When we got there, we were told that we couldn’t bring any food or drink into the building. Sarah and I, being the thrifty travelers that we are, had packed bagels for lunch, sandwiches for dinner, and some bananas for snacks. Faced with throwing them away, eating them, or not going to the Capitol, we decided to sit down and eat what we could/would. We were able to get through a fair amount of it although we uncomfortably full afterwards. If it had not been for a family with 4 small, ravenous children, I’m pretty sure that we would have hurt ourselves with food. Anyway, we made it through the tunnel and lined up for the tour.
The tour begins with a movie entitled “Out of many, one.” Basically, it’s a 13-minute long video about how awesome Congress is, how they “represent the will of the people,” and some of the landmark legislation that has been enacted over the years. Actually, watching the movie makes one even more frustrated with the current situation in which little of real consequence seems to be done without recriminations from one side or the other. I’m not saying that it’s new or unique to this Congress, but when you look at all of the past legislation that’s been enacted it makes you think. We had a great tour guide who led us through the core of the capitol building, including the crypt, rotunda and the Statuary Room. The rotunda was especially cool, with painting of the singing of the Declaration of Independence, the surrender of the British at the Battle of Saratoga, and Washington turning in his commission after defeating Cornwallis. Finally, we learned a little bit about the acoustics of the Statuary Room, which used to be the room in which the House of Representatives met. The slope of the curved ceiling is such that there is a set of point on opposite sides of the room from which someone can perfectly hear another person, as if they were sitting next to each other. Not a great thing when you’re trying to have a private conversation and someone from the other party, on the other side of the room, can hear exactly what you’re saying.
Upon exiting our air-conditioned havens at the Capitol and Library of Congress, we walked over to the Russel Senate Offices in order to visit Gina, who works for the Senate Committee for Veterans’ Affairs. It is, as many government buildings in Washington are, very impressive, very heavy on the expensive stonework, and very important-feeling. Her office was on the fourth floor, and the hearing room included in it is where the Titanic hearings were held following the disaster. From there Sarah and I made the long slog through the heat and humidity to the Museum of Natural History, ducked into the cool air, and gladly submitted to our fourth security search of the day.
The Museum of Natural History (hereafter referred to as MNH, because I don’t want to type it over and over again) is a monster of a museum. Sarah and I selected a few of the exhibits that we wanted to see and set our tired feet toward them. We started off with the Mammals area, which was packed with fun displays various mammas from around the world. After perusing through there and avoiding the masses of children we went into the Origins of Man exhibit, which basically summarized my entire Bachelor’s Degree in one place. It covered everything from basic genetics and primate characteristics to the most recent Neandertal DNA studies and many of the milestones in human cultural development. I even talked with one of the docents for a while, who seemed genuinely excited to be talking with someone who knew a bit about the content of the exhibit. From there we went through the oceans exhibit, although at this point I was exhausted and was only able to half-heartedly commit myself to reading the displays. For the most part I looked for cool looking models or displays, glazed over them, and went on my way. I was suffering from serious museum fatigue at that point. Finally, we went through the geology and minerals section, which featured a lot of cool information about geology, tons of different minerals/gems, and many amazing examples of jewelry, including the Hope Diamond. The Hope Diamond was a lot like the Mon Lisa: super-famous, kind of cool to look at, and for the most part very over-rated in my opinion. It wasn’t as big, impressive, sparkly, or beautiful as many of the other stones in the collection, and it said literally nothing about the history that’s supposed to be part of the reason that it’s so famous. After that we got up our strength and retreated to the metro to head back to Gina’s place.
Once back at Gina’s we ate dinner and hung out for a while before driving over to the White House around sunset, then driving around the city a bit and returning. At that point we were wiped and watched a bit of trashy MTV shows before going to bed. DC? Check. On to Philly.
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