Sunday, May 16, 2010

Washington DC - Day Four

Our fourth day in DC also started out early, as our congressman had arranged an 8:45 AM tour at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, so we had to be on the move by about 7:45 to walk to the Metro Station, make a few transfers, walk a few blocks, find the wrong entrance, and get in and through security. This was a fascinating tour about how our paper money is printed, but no photos were allowed! Here's a shot from the gift shop, where EJ and Sophie were trying to see how much money they were worth!



About halfway through the tour, the emergency alarm sounded and was telling us all to evacuate the building immediately. We quickly found out this was just a test, but it had us all wondering for a while! EJ bought herself about $500 worth of shredded money for $5, and we bought Sophie some lucky money for the year of the dog (when she was born). It's a dollar bill from the year 2006 that the serial number begins with 888 (considered lucky in Chinese!). We tried to get some for EJ but the year of the rabbit was sold out...it will be out again next year though!

Notice how blue and sunny the sky is in the next photo. Well, since this day was the first one that didn't threaten rain, the girls and I wore shorts. Big mistake. It was probably only in the mid-40s in the morning and then it might have climbed to 50. We were freezing and the wind was blowing terribly hard. Nonetheless, we had wanted to do a bunch of outdoor walking among the monuments, so perhaps we just walked a little faster than usual. Our first leg of the walk took us around the tidal basin to see the Jefferson Memorial. All of the cherry blossoms were gone - darn!



As we worked our way around the tidal basin, we came across the FDR monument, which I had never seen. It was really very nice.


You can see that at some point after the Jefferson memorial, I realized I had a change of clothes in the backpack for Sophie, so I slid some leggings on under her skirt, and she put her extra socks on as mittens!


Here are EJ and Sophie in the bread line:

A short walk further brought us to the Korean Monument. I had never seen it before, and it was amazing too. I noticed that each of the soldiers had a small spotlight on it, and I imagine that it is quite eerie to see at night.
There is a marble wall to the left of the above photograph. It has engraved faces of Korean War soldiers on it, and it is meant to reflect the statues of the soldiers.
This gentleman is a Korean War veteran. He was happy to share some of his experiences with the school groups that were visiting, and all the kids shook his hand when he was done speaking:
We finally made it to the Lincoln Memorial:


EJ always finds the horses:



Yup, there's that "tall pointy building" again (as Sophie called it):



I think Sophie half expected old Abe to stand up, as in the Night at the Museum 2 movie:



Next was the Vietnam Wall...a very powerful memorial:


After this long hike, we were starved, but kinda sorta on the wrong end of town for most restaurants. We wandered around a few blocks, and someone suggested walking north toward George Washington University. Still nothing. Finally, K went into a CVS and asked for a suggestion. They said the Red Cross headquarters was just a block east and it had a cafeteria, so that's where we went! After lunch, back down to the mall to see the World War 2 monument.



I figure we walked close to six miles this day. After getting back to our Metro stop, we went to Pizzeria Paradiso in Dupont Circle, voted the best pizza in DC, to grab a slice. Not bad! I think we all fell asleep pretty quickly this night.

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NAMGIANG said...
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