NY/DC Trip - Day 6

Good morning Washington, D.C. W hotel Fantastic Suite!

We met Mom at 9:30am and had our complimentary breakfast at the hotel.  I ordered the American breakfast which consisted of scrambled eggs, chicken sausage, skillet potatoes, wheat toast and orange juice.  It was all good, but the chicken sausage was excellent.

After breakfast we arranged for our complimentary car to pick us up at 2:30pm on Saturday to take us to the airport.  After that was taken care of, we headed out for the day and quickly realized it was freezing cold out - the temperature was in the low 40s, but after a short while it felt like it was in the teens.  Should of packed my thermals.

We walked to the front side of the White House, well as close as we could get, anyway, then walked to the Washington Monument.  We got there at 11:30am, and found out it's a timed entry system.  We picked up 3 free tickets for 12:30pm and waited at the base for our turn.

"We'll split up - you run left and I'll dash right.  Stay low, use the trees for cover and..."

"...Uh-oh, cheese it you guys - it's the fuzz!"

Distance from the White House fence

Monumental

People waiting to go to the top

National Mall, Reflecting Pool and Lincoln Memorial

The National Mall and Capitol.  That little building directly ahead is where you get the tickets for the Washington Monument.  It also has bathrooms and toasty warm hand dryers.

Notice the two different colors of stone?  The monument sat unfinished for 25 years due to lack of funding.  From the National Park Service website:   "When the monument was under construction in 1854, the Washington National Monument Society ran out of money and the project ground to a halt. Twenty-five years later, the U.S. Government took over and completed the upper two-thirds of the structure by 1884 using marble from a different quarry. The two sections closely resembled each other at first, but time, wind, rain, and erosion have caused the marble sections to weather differently, thereby producing the difference in color. A third type of marble is also visible at the dividing line between the two main phases of construction."  The park ranger we spoke with at the monument said they picked the new stone for it's color as they thought that as it weathered and aged it would eventually match the stone at the base.  They did the best they could, I guess.

Corner detail

We met a nice, funny (funny strange, not funny ha-ha) older woman in a bright, blue coat who asked us to save her place in the 12:30 line, then proceeded to wander all over the place and back multiple times because she was cold.  Mom saw her talking to the park rangers several times and called it by saying she was trying to get in with 12:00 people.  Sure enough, she disappeared for a while and when it came time to let in that group she was suddenly first in line.

We waited our turn and after passing through security we went up in the elevator (did you know:  steel beams reinforce the elevator shaft only - the rest of the monument and the support structure is made solely of stone).

Elevator

After looking out all the windows we went back down.

The legend of the West

To the North:  The Ellipse, the National Christmas Tree and The White House

To the East:  The National Mall, Smithsonian Museums, Smithsonian Castle, other museums, and the U.S. Capitol.  The IRS is in the buildings on the left with the orange/red roofs.

To the West:  World War II Monument, Reflecting Pool, Constitution Gardens, Lincoln Memorial.  Across the river lies Virginia.

To the South:  The Thomas Jefferson Memorial.  Behind the memorial, across the river, is Ronald Reagan International Airport.  In the middle right of the photo is the Pentagon.

Cross section showing the inside of the peak.

Looking up inside the peak.  The viewing windows are behind the plexiglass, and that's one of the red aircraft warning lights directly above.

Of course, what they look like when lit-up are Jody pig eyes from The Amityville Horror.  See below.  Photo from dcjournalismintern.wordpress.com.

Demon pig or national monument?  You decide.  Photo from retrocrush.com.

After the monument, we walked to the United States Holocaust Museum, which I was not looking forward to.  I'll clarify that by saying the museum is one of the best museums I've ever been to, and the building is my favorite museum building - the architecture, layout and materials fit the exhibits so perfectly.  The reason I was dreading this visit was because Todd and I had previously been in 2001, and it's a very, very powerful experience.   I knew exactly what to expect:  horror upon horror upon horror - atrocities beyond imagining visited upon human beings by other human beings.

We started with a 30-minute guided tour of the exhibit:  Some Were Neighbors:  Collaboration & Complicity in the Holocaust.  Then we toured the rest of the museum at our own pace, finishing at 4:30pm.  More than any monument or memorial, this is a must-witness location for anyone visiting DC.

We walked back toward the hotel and stopped and Corner Bakery for dinner.  I ordered the chicken carbonara pasta and a blueberry hand pie.  Both were ok.  We then walked next door to Marshalls where I bought a hat and a scarf, Mom bought a scarf, and Todd bought a satchel, which he needed because his green, held-together-with-duct-tape backpack was a little embarrassing.

It was raining outside by the time we finished.  Luckily, we didn't have far to go.  We walked the block back to our hotel for an early evening in at 6:30pm.  We had more fruit waiting for us, and a hand-signed (hey, the little touches are what make the difference) letter from the Anytime/Anywhere desk confirming our car for Saturday.  We watched tv, surfed on the iPad, listened to music, ate fruit; and I made coffee in the room.  At 9:00 I drew a bath, and we went to bed at 11:15pm.