Capital Trip - Part One

A note of warning before I begin - most of this is really going to be 'for-the-record.'

Day One - Arrival, Capitol, Library of Congress

We left Chicago early in the morning, amidst weather concerns. Despite the clouds that loomed above us, we reached the O'Hare airport safe and dry. A sign of things to come, that was.. Upon arriving at the Baltimore Washington International Airport (BWI), we purchased the wrong pass (Maryland MTA!), although it didn't cost us too much. We soon figured out the right shuttle, and a short train ride and loooong walk later, we arrived at our little hostel. Inside we met one of the caretakers, Antonio who was pretty helpful throughout.

We didn't waste much time, as within half an hour we were off to downtown DC - namely the Union Station. From there, we walked a block south to the US Capitol..

We spent quite a bit of time walking around the building on a hot & sunny day. The US Supreme Court was just across the street as well. It wasn't too long though before we were desperate for some hydration, and our saving grace came in the form of the Grotto.

We then made our way to the Library of Congress - the world's largest library. It truly is a thing of beauty, and they also house quite a collection of the personal works of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. One thing that did bug us though was that every time we deployed the tripod, a park ranger would come up to us immediately and tell us that tripods are not allowed on the premises. Of course, we found out later that we could acquire permission to use the tripod on those grounds from the authorities, but we didn't bother to trouble ourselves over it.

Just around the corner is the US Botanical Gardens, which unfortunately was closed by the time we got there on that day. There was an external park, however so we ended up walking through the plethora of flowers that swayed to the afternoon breeze.

By the end of all that it was time for dinner, and we had our meal at Chinatown (after a typical mini-adventure on foot inspired by yours truly). Quite a bit of walking on the day, but we were still taking it easy as it was our arrival day. Long, long walks would typify the following days..

Day Two - Museums, museums, museums..

One of DC's main attraction is its splendid national museums, which are made all the more appealing by their free admission. We definitely weren't intent on missing out on those, as we spent our second day walking around the massive museums. We began with the Smithsonian Castle, an old Smithsonian building that now serves as the Visitor Center.

Of course, there wasn't much to see in it, but it does have free wi-fi within its compounds. We began our tour of the museums with the National Museum of Natural History. I thought New York's Natural History museum was incredible: this one just blew it away. They had excellent exhibits - ranging from stuffed wildlife, to the actual skulls and bones of ancient human beings. the highlight though was the Hope Diamond, which was displayed in all its majesty within the museum. There is so much history and lore that surrounds this finely-cut blue diamond, and I stood gawking along with a host of others at the marvelous jewel.

Our next stop was the National Museum of American History -which is basically a group of massive galleries that tell the entire story of how this incredible nation has become what it is today. I myself was able to learn quite a few things along the way. The highlight of this museum though is the original Star-Spangled Banner that fluttered across the skies at Fort McHenry as Francis Scott Keys composed the nation's national anthem.

Next up was the National Air and Space Museum: a huge gallery with giant spacecrafts displayed within the building - mostly suspended from the ceiling. Again, it was an honor to relive the history of aviation and space exploration. As time ran out, we didn't manage to complete all of the exhibits before the museum closed at 7.30pm. What awaited us outside though was daunting - dark, dark clouds that spelled troubled as clearly as they could.

Somehow, despite the crazy rain that ensued while we were on the train headed back to the hostel - it stopped for a bit just as we reached our stop, giving us enough time to complete our considerably long walk back to the hostel completely dry before pouring down once again. Seriously, I must thank the Weather Gods for a wonderful favor! Such were the first two days, but there's more.. much more.