Thursday

Thursday was our big day for cycling, but first we had to assemble the bikes.

We are getting faster! Mike had an extra piece for his bike, though, that he couldn’t figure out where it should go. Then he bent to pick it up and realized it was the metal door stop.

We headed down to the Mall so we could see some more of the monuments, including the Korean War Monument, a closer look at the WWII monument now that we had learned more about it, the Vietnam War Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial. All so different from each other and powerful in their own ways. Earlier we had seen an exhibit on the design of the WWII monument, particularly these relief panels.

Our route next took us onto the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal trail, which is part of the National Park system. If we had stayed on it we could have gone all the way to Pennsylvania! That seemed a bit extreme for the day, but we did enjoy riding along the old canal where the tow path is now the trail.

We soon diverted onto the Capital Crescent Trail trail that took us up to Bethesda and Chevy Chase, which made a good lunch stop.

After lunch we took another route back – the Rock Creek Trail –  that had some choppy hills that made Tami’s weenie legs grumpy, but it eventually turned into a better trail that took us back into the city.

Friday

While Mike was off to his meetings, Tami headed back down to the Mall to continue museum hopping. It’s so great that they are all so centrally located and also free! The Natural History Museum and the American Indian Museum were on the menu for the day. Tami particularly enjoyed the sections on the Evolution of Man, with lots of skulls and lifelike recreations of what early hominids would have looked like.

Another fossil type area had more information of very early evolution of life and the amazing life forms discovered in places like the Burgess Shale in British Columbia, along with fossils of early sea life.

Another favorite area was on plate tectonics and volcanoes. There were even some undersea lava samples donated by John Delaney, who she used to work for at the UW. Remember glass picking, Mel?

To finish the day, Tami headed to the American Indian Museum. At first it was disappointing because the first two floors had very little in them. But the top floor had an exhibit on the history of treaties, which included a large amount on the fishing treaties in the Pacific Northwest. Another good exhibit was about various belief systems of different groups in North America, and there was also an exhibit on the Inca highway.
Tired, tired feet! That was a lot of museum to cover.

Saturday

But wait, there’s more! Museums, that is. Mike had yet more meetings so Tami went first to the Air and Space Museum. So much to cover, so little time. We have such a great flight museum in Seattle, but the Air and Space Museum covers so many great aspects of flight and space as well. There was a great exhibit on the whole story behind the Wright Brothers and their development of the first powered flight. They started out making bicycles! The original Wright Flyer no longer exist but they have a full size replica.

The museum also has comprehensive coverage of the whole space race and space program. Mike’s dad worked on the Apollo program and it was so cool to see the Apollo 11 command module.

Tami’s dad worked on the Lunar Orbiter program, and there was also one of the test Lunar Orbiter vehicles in the museum.

Next stop, National Art Gallery. Wow, what a collection. There were nearly two full rooms of Rembrandts, and the Impressionism section had many pictures by Monet, Manet, Cézanne, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro and even a couple by Van Gogh. It was so great to see so many examples of each artist next to each other and really see the differences in their styles. There was also a good collection of sculptures by Rodin.

Tami could have spent a lot more time, but the feet said NO! and we also needed to start packing, including the bikes. So back up to the hotel and a few last pictures of Washington DC on the walk under changing skies. The weather is turning a bit colder so we seem to be leaving just in time.