Sunday, we got up, loaded the van and had breakfast-at IHOP again. It was right there, no thinking involved.
After that, we drove through Alexandria looking for the ghost tour meeting place and then took the George Washington Parkway all the way to the 495 loop. Along the way, we stopped at Gravelly Point and watched the planes take off from the Reagan Airport, then went by Arlington Cemetery and saw the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the Kennedy grave sites.
John, Jacqueline, an infant son, Patrick and unnamed stillborn daughter
The
tomb of the Unknown Soldier
HERE RESTS IN HONORED GLORY AND AMERICAN SOLDIER KNOWN BUT TO GOD
We ended up, after quite the drive along the Potomac, and a long stop-n-go on the Beltway, at the National Zoo. That place is HUGE and we walked for hours and hours and still did not see 75% of it. But we saw things totally new to us, like a porcupine/monkey and a mouse deer. We saw a shrimp that could break glass with his super smack attack, an elephant shrew, about 90 tamarind monkeys, leaf-cutter ants, giant anteaters, birds I have never even heard of, tiny small clawed otters, giant pandas and so much more. The zoo was by far and away our favorite part of D.C. and the only place the kids have said they ever want to see again.
It's a full-service zoo!
T-rex ate my baby!
The kids said it 'looked like Dad'
This is a pigeon
Watching the pandas was just like watching Jessie and Kuma, all they did was loll around, wrestle and snack.
The porcupine with the prehensile tail
Golden Orb Weaver
We left the zoo at dark, deciding we had enough walking for one day-we opted to skip the ghost tour-and ended up driving on out of the city for the night, I did not want to battle the Monday traffic after getting snarled in the 'Sunday Drive' traffic, it was horrible. I was not scared driving in ALL those cars, but it was very stressful. I doubt we will go back to D.C. any time soon.
My over-all impression was of a clean city, the people are very active-loads of people everywhere walking and jogging and there is tons of green space for it to be such a huge city. I loved the lay-out of the surrounding areas and how there were so many unusual stores tucked in every nook and cranny. The women were polished and neat, not one of them looked like they ever had a cowlick or oily skin.
We did not see any panhandlers, there were police literally on every block, I bet the ratio of police to citizen is 1:10 there. I felt very safe out walking around. The 'worst' thing that happened in D.C. was on the elevator coming down from the top of the Washington Monument. I mistook a very small Asian woman for Chandler and tried snuggling her into my side as the ranger slowed the car to chat about the stones we could see through the glass doors. I actually grabbed her thinking I would steady Chan and accidentally smacked her head into my boob when the car jolted back into motion. *sigh*
Chan and her My Twinn, Jennifer Claire a.k.a. Fern
I drove us all the way to Front Royal where we got a room at the very manky Relax Inn only because I was way too tired to play the lower-rate run-around and did not have a motel coupon book for that area. The room was-at least-blessedly quiet and we slept until 8 on Monday morning.