25 Weeks: Washington DC

This past weekend we enjoyed a wonderful vacation to Washington D.C. It was Travis' first time to see   our nations capitol.  We got there on Friday and headed home on Tuesday.  We hit all of the major sites spending lots of time on our feet walking! By the end of each day we were ready to crash.

Day 1: We arrived in Virginia by about 9:30 in the morning. We got a rental car for the day so that we could explore Mt. Vernon. It was really hot!

Day 2: We rode the Metro downtown.

First site, the US Capital. Before heading to the Holocaust Museum. The Holocaust Museum was wonderful but also very draining. Next we went to the Air and Space Museum and then part of the National Museum of American History before heading back on the Metro to our hotel (by this time our feet were killing us and we had our fill of museums for the day)   

Day 3:  We started off with Arlington National Cemetery before check out all of the memorials.

It is amazing to see the rows upon rows of perfectly spaced headstones of all the men and women who have served our country.

The reflecting pool is very unimpressive when there is no water in it! They are undergoing a  construction project to improve the reflecting pool.

Travis was amazed at all the people who were taking pictures like this all over DC so he decided he needed to try it out.

My favorite memorial would have to be the WWII memorial. Around the outside each state is displayed with a  wreath.

Travis wanted to show his dislike of California.

and his love of Nebraska

We ended the memorials tour by walking over to Jefferson Memorial, once again by the end of the day we were tired of all the walking and a little sunburnt after sweating off our sunscreen.

 Day 4: We started off day for by viewing the White House before continuing on to the Museum of Natural History and then finishing the Museum of American History.

One of our favorite places of the day was Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. This was a sculpture of  plastic strings that hung down that you could walk through. It was pretty cool to walk through.

 After finishing up the museums we did some souvenir shopping and we had supper downtown so that we could (I could) take pictures of some of the monuments in the dark. Travis was kind enough to suffer with his blister long enough for me to get the "artistic" pictures I wanted.

Day 5: The last day. We had a little bit of time before we had to be at the airport so we decided to go to the Pentagon to see the 9.11 Memorial.

There is a bench for each person who lost their life at the Pentagon that day. The benches are arranged by year and  as you read the names on the bench you face either the sky or the Pentagon for those who lost their life in the plane crash or in the building respectively.

Now we are back home, back and back to work. But we are very thankful we got to enjoy this vacation together especially before we have a little one to take care of!