Washington D.C.

I have a couple of posts about Washington D.C. and this will be the last one. These are the pictures of us hitting the different tourist spots.

The first night was spent as an entire group. When we went to Old Ebbitt grill we had also visited The Whitehouse. (By the way I added some pictures to the Old Ebbitt Grill Post.)Me and my dang eyes always closing! The next day is when we hit the Smithsonians, mainly because it was snowing. Then the final day we went to the different monuments and memorials. The second two days is when the groups split up. Here is the group that I hung out with (plus Haidee who is taking the picture.)

The Washington Monument

The World War II Memorial

Finally The Lincoln Memorial From the Lincoln Memorial you can look back over the reflection pool and see the Washington Memorial.

Smithsonian

During our trips to DC we visited three of the five Smithsonian museums, which I thoroughly enjoyed. The first museum we visited was the Air and Space museum. There were tons of cool planes.

Then we went to the Holocaust museum, but I didn’t take any pictures because we are not allowed. That was the saddest museum. They had even had kids portion of the museum where kids can read about a child’s diary from the holocaust. There was so much information it took a couple of hours to go through and there was still tons of stuff I missed.

The final museum we went to was the Museum of Natural History. This was probably my favorite museum, many amazing exhibits. On the first floor were animal exhibit and had tons of stuffed animals from everywhere including the sea. Then on the second floor has a geology section which included famous jewels such as the hope diamond. They had a diadem worn my Napoleon’s wife. Emeralds and rubies. Of course one of my favorite exhibits.

Some of the artifacts from the second Night at the Museum movie were in this museum and I had to get a picture with the Easter Island statue.

Also on the second floor was a Butterfly habitat. I’m girly girl and loved the many flowers and butterflies. With winter being right outside I really enjoyed the flowers. This picture actually has at least 4 or 5 butterflies, but they are hard to see.

There was one huge blue butterfly that would not stay still for long so this was the best picture I got of it.

The butterflies kept landing on me. I don’t know if it was because of my colorful shirt or if I had a scent they like, but this little girl kept asking me how I was getting them to land on me (the girl.

Architecture

I love to look at different buildings and the beautiful art that can come from them. Grand columns, colorful windows, arches and even the many different beautiful stones or other materials that buildings are made from. One of my favorite things about D.C. was the beautiful buildings, both modern and neoclassical. Although many of my favorite buildings were neoclassical. Here are some pictures of the gorgeous buildings. Even the McDonald’s has interesting architecture. This is the Smithsonian Castle which is actually rather large, but I only got a picture of part of the building.

Old Ebbitt Grill

Spent my first night in DC and LOVED the place we went to eat. We have a huge group of 17 people and went to the White House first where a cop recommended the Old Ebbitt Grill. It was actually really late, 10 pm, but the place was still way crowded. It took about 40 min for us to get seated but what do you expect with a group that big. However, we quickly ordered and the food was up extremely quickly. I think we spent more time waiting for the table then actually seating at the table and the food was delicious. Here are the pictures from Old Ebbitt Grill. Most are when we are outside waiting some are actually candid.

Agecroft Hall and Virginia House

So while my stay here in Virginia I saw something in a brochure about this museum called Agecroft Hall. It’s a house, well a manor, built in the 1600’s during the Tudor period and ended up going on auction during the early 1900s where a rich guy in Virginia decided to buy the house and have it shipped to Virginia. He lived in the house for 1 year before he died. His widow remarried and continued to live the house and when they got to old to live in the house they made it a museum. I was only able to take pictures outside the house, but the museum put furniture that was created in the 1600’s and the tour was mostly of how people lived during the Medieval times.

Before the tour I roamed the gardens which sadly were not all that impressive. There were lots of dead leaves and a few spider webs across the path which was creepy and then I kept hearing noises in the bushes which creeped me out even more. It only turned out to be squirrels, but they were mean and angry looking squirrels haha.

Although the gardens were not that impressive during my visit, I am sure it was because of the season. I bet in the springtime this place is gorgeous. I saw pictures with perennial flowers that usually bloom in spring. There are three gardens, the main garden, the sunken garden and the herb garden. The ladies of the manors during the 1600’s were taught to grow herbs and how to make perfumes, liquor and medicine from these herbs.

Main Garden:                                Sunken Garden:                                                      Herb Garden:                                                                    

So there is house right next to Agecroft Hall called the Virginia House. The Virginia House is similar to Agecroft hall because it was built in England and Shipped to Virginia, but I don’t know anything more then that. However, after my tour of Agecroft Hall the group was told that even though the museum was closed due to lack of funding that we could still wander the gardens. While I enjoyed Agecroft Hall, the Virginia House is more to my taste. I think it is beautiful. Here are few of the pictures there are more on facebook.