Skip to main content

Sunday Night in DC

I had hoped to visit all the monuments west of the Washington Monument while we had the car, but we ran out of time.  The only one we visited was the Jefferson Memorial which is on the south side of the Tidal Basin.  We were too early in the season to see the blossoms on the cherry trees that arearound the Tidal Basin.  After 9-11 they moved the parking lot that was right south of the Jefferson Memorial.  Now we had to park over a quarter mile away and walk.  The statue of Jefferson shows him standing, looking across the Tidal Basin at the Washington Mounument.  I remember a few years ago when I came to DC with a group from Berthold to attend the natioal ABC convention.  Tanya was too young to go into the Holacaust Museum so she and I rented a paddle boat and cruised around the Tidal Basin.
     In the evening David and I met my cousin Blanch at a chile place in Alexandria for supper.  King Street in Alexandria is a tourist place with many quaint shops and restaurants.  A free trolley runs the length of the street.  The next time I come to DC I migght stay in one of the motels near the west end of King Street.  Alexandria is also the place of the school in the movie "Remember the Titans."  Both Blanch and I got confused because the Jefferson Davis Highway which we came into Alexandria on is not called that in town.  David and I asked a number of people on the street how to find it but they were all from out of town.  It took us 15 minutes to get out of there.  David has lost all confidence in my ability to navigate.  We turned in the rental car and traveled by bus, subway, and taxi back to our motel which is on the north end of DC, actually in College Park, MD.  So far nothing we have seen in Washington has impressed David more than Gettysburg.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ford's Theater

The theater where Lincoln was shot has been completely changed since the last time I visited a few years ago.  They purchased the building.next door and turned it into the box office.  The museum in the basement is much better than it was before.  The derringer used by Booth has a prominent place.  Most of the other weapons used by the conspirators are on display as well.  The pistol and knife Powell attacked Seward with and the rifles, pistols, and knives Booth and Herold had with them during their twelve days on the run were there.  It is a great museum, but anyone who plans on visiting should study up on the assassination first.      Visiting the theater itself was a disappointment.  I expected a ranger talk, but there was none.  The theater is a working theater and workers were busy building a set.  Nonetheless, I still get the willies when I think of what happened in there.
Post a Comment
Read more

Smithsonian

There is so much to see in the museums on both sides of the National Mall I cannot possibly mention everything. I will list that which stands out.      Mueum of Natural History:  a huge stuffed elephant that dominates the rotunda, dozens of dinosaur skeletons, the Hope diamond, gemstones galore, and Egyptian mummies.      Museum of American History:  the section on civil rights from 1863 to 1963, the stories of Medal of Honor winners, the section on America at War, the section on Thomas Edison.     Air and Space Museum:  the Wright brother's plane, all the Apollo space stuff about how we went to the moon, the section on telescopes,  the section on aircraft carriers, the section on taking photographs from the air.  This last sectio n covered everything from the first pictures taken from the air in baloons and from cameras strapped to the bellies of birds to pictures taken from modern satellites.  Of all the museums...
Post a Comment
Read more

President's Graves

On this trip with David we are going to visit the graves of five Presidents.  One of the greatest, George Washington at Mount Vernon.  One of the worst, James Buchanan at Lancaster, PA.  Three in the middle.  Woodrow Wilson at the National Cathedral in Washington.  John Kennedy and Howard Taft at Arlington Cemetary in Virginia.  The two most impressive Presidential graves I have been to are Lincoln's in Springfield, IL, and Grant's in New York  City.      I have been to 17 of the 39 Presidential graves.  Most of them are very humble.   many are located in regular cemetaries.  Their grave stones are less remarkable than many others in the same cemetary.  I found this to be true of Buchanan's in Lancaster and Tyler's in Richmond.  Many are buried at their Presidential libraries, such as Hoover and Truman.  Some are buried at their homes, such as Washington, Jefferson, and FDR.      I think Lin...
1 comment
Read more