Tuesday, September 6, 2011

adventures in the Washington DC area

Jake and I took a trip to Washington DC at the end of August.  We were there the 22nd through 29th and stayed with one of his good friends and his friend's wife in Maryland.  They're in the Air Force and will be deployed this fall so we wanted to visit them before that happened.   I say adventures in my title because we were there during the most recent East Coast earthquake and Hurricane Irene.  It was a more exciting trip than we'd planned, but it was still a good trip.


I did not take a record amount of photos on this trip with a little under 150 total.  That is still way more than you would want to see here.  I have the full set up on Facebook.  Here are a few of the major highlights.

We spend Tuesday and Wednesday in downtown DC.  On Tuesday, we saw:

Jefferson Memorial


World War II Memorial


Washington Monument
White House


Ford's Theater

We were walking to Ford's Theater when the earthquake hit.  Within seconds, people were pouring out of buildings.

On Wednesday, we saw:
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

The National Portrait Gallery (That's George Gershwin if anyone was curious.)

We also visited the Rotunda where of course picture taking is not allowed.

On Thursday, we went to Old Town in Alexandra.  Our friends had strongly urged us to go to the Torpedo Factory so we did.

There was one jewelry artist whose shop is called Poppishop.  It was by far my favorite thing there.  I'm sure that it's not a surprise why I enjoyed her work so much.  These photos are from her web site.  She doesn't have an Etsy shop, but you can buy her work right from her site.  She has jewelry in shops all around the country, too.


No vacation is complete for me without some pictures of ducks.

On Friday, we drove out to Gettysburg.

We were inside most of Saturday and Sunday because of the hurricane.  We went out to the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception on Sunday afternoon.

While we were there, I took these next two pictures just for you guys.


Another one of Jake's friends picked us up from the airport when we got home.  We went to the T.G.I. Friday's in Miller Park for an early dinner.

And now we've been home for a week or so.  It's good to travel, but it's good to be home again, too.

6 comments:

  1. I lived in Old Town Alexandria for 10 years - I miss it a lot and the Torpedo Factory was always on our walk list - the artists work and sell there and they are always changing. Was the parrot man outside? Always good street musicians there as well. Makes me home sick ::sigh::

    ReplyDelete
  2. Looks like a fun trip :)
    Glad you made it home safe after the earthquake and hurricane!!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. looks fun! And what an experience - an earthquake and a hurricane! I think I stayed in a hotel near the Basilica, and we walked past it every day. Never went inside though... {:-D

    ReplyDelete
  4. Looks like a fun time! It's been years since I've been to D.C. but I hope to go back soon. Thanks for sharing your photos!

    ReplyDelete
  5. What a great trip - and so many good stories to go with it :)

    I would like to take our kids to DC someday.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Grace, we did not see the parrot man. Sorry. :( I hope that bringing up the memories wasn't too sad for you.

    Deb, the basilica is in a pretty bad neighborhood. Hopefully you weren't too close to it!

    I'm glad that everyone enjoyed the photos!

    ReplyDelete

Your comments mean so much to me! Thank you for taking the time to leave your thoughts, questions, and feedback.