Since I was a young girl, I dreamed of visiting Washington Dc. I wanted to see with my own eyes all the important aspects of our nation's political system. I wanted to be totally immersed in history. And most importantly, I wanted to see my future residence, The White House. When I started working at a hotel, I knew I needed to take advantage of the hotel discounts and the first place I wanted to go was DC. There were no other options. Luckily we had some free flights, I found some great hotel rooms for $29 a night, and most of the items I wanted to tour was free. It wasn't hard to convince Austin to take some vacation days and play tourist with me.
We dropped the girls off at my parent's (thanks guys!), and then headed to beautiful, humid Washington DC. We flew in late at night, spent 3 full days there, and then flew out in the morning. It rained the whole time we were there, but that didn't put a damper on our trip. We were constantly on the go. There was so much to do and such little time! We didn't rent a car so we relied on the Metro. On our first day, we started the day walking around the National Mall. The National Mall is huge so we walked A LOT. We went to the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, WWII Memorial, and Vietnam War Memorial to name a few. We then spent the afternoon touring some Smithsonian Museums and paying our respects at Arlington Cemetery. That night we braved the rain and did a night tour on the double-decker bus. This was one of my favorite parts of the trip. I loved seeing the sites lit up in the dark.
The next morning we continued on visiting the Smithsonian Museums. We were fortunate enough to snag some tickets to the Museum of African American History. It had only been open a couple of days and it was packed! My favorite museums were the American History Museum and the Holocaust Museum. We also went to the Pentagon to see the 9/11 Memorial. That night we called it quits a bit earlier than usual and headed back to the hotel to swim and watch the BYU football game.
Our last day, we woke up bright and early to tour the White House. This was a dream come true! Security was brutal but it was well worth it. I loved asked the secret service questions about each room, seeing where press conferences are held, and just dreaming. This was definitely another highlight of the trip. After the White House, we toured the Library of Congress, the Supreme Court, and then got a tour of the Capitol. I will admit, I was pretty disappointed in the Capitol tour. It seemed like it was an hour tour on the art of the building and that was it. And they didn't even show us the floor where they argue and vote on issues. That is what I wanted to see most. #FirstWorldProblems. The afternoon we toured the National Bureau of Printing and Engraving aka see where money is made. To end the trip, we headed to a Washington National's Major League Baseball game. Of course they were on a rain delay for hours, We tried to stick around but we were getting wet and it was getting late. So we left before they even started playing. Of course, not long after we left, they started back up. It was still fun to be in the stadium and walk around.
I was so sad to see the trip come to the end. I may or may not have looked up jobs in the DC area once or twice since our return. I loved the hustle and bustle of the city. I loved being in the midst of history being made. I loved people watching on the metro. I loved the purpose behind each building. I just loved it all...
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| Lincoln Memorial |
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| White House |
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| Museum of African-American History and Culture |
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| Washington Monument |
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| WWII Museum and Washington Monument |
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| Pretty Architecture everywhere. |
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| Arlington Cemetary |
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| Supreme Court |
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| Nationals Baseball Game |
