Aching legs!
Scott-Free’s blog
Steve & Chris
Fri 24 Jun 2011 18:24
Friday 24th June
2011
We have just about
walked our legs off over the last week!
On Sunday we walked
the National Mall and spent some time in the Museum of Natural History. This has
some excellent displays, and I particularly enjoyed the hall of Human
Origins.
On Monday we visited
the Air & Space Museum, where we saw several of the lunar modules, including
the Apollo II command module which carried Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins to the
moon in 1969. The landing module looked like something Primary school kids
might have made using cereal packets and egg boxes! We also saw some early
aeroplanes,including the first Wright brothers aeroplane and the Spirit of
St Louis in which Lindbergh made the first non-stop flight from New York to
Paris.
Apollo II command module
Columbia The
Spirit of St Louis
Later
we visited the World War II memorial, the Korean War memorial and the
Vietnam War memorial, all of which were very moving. We also visited
the Lincoln Memorial, but as is usual with our timing, the reflecting pool which
usually stretches from here to the Washington Monument was being redug and was
actually a muddy mess rather than a tranquil pool! We could see the
White House from the Washington Monument and decided our legs wouldn't take us
any closer!
The World War II
Memorial
The Korean War Memorial
The Vietnam War
Memorial
The Lincoln Memorial
View from the
Lincoln Memorial steps towards the
Capitol
The White House
We had
found the Air & Space Museum so interesting that on Tuesday we
took a bus out to Dulles airport where we picked up the shuttlebus to the Steven
F. Udvar-Hazy Center, which houses the rest of the collection plus all the big
exhibits in huge hangars. Here again we took the free tour and learnt some
interesting facts from a very knowledgeable ex-WWII pilot.
Space shuttle
Enterprise
On Wednesday we
visited the Museum of American History, where they have an interesting display
on the history of pop-up books as well as Judy Garland's ruby slippers in the
Treasures of Popular Culture display, as well as the expected stuff
about their history including independence from us Brits and all the Presidents
and their wives. The section on African American history was very
interesting and well-presented, documenting the treatment of African Americans
from the days of slavery and how they have been portrayed in the media. This
section is soon to be moved to a Museum of African American History &
Culture, currently being built in the National Mall.
Ruby slippers
from The Wizard of Oz
On Thursday we saw
money being printed at the Bureau of Engraving & Printing - a visit kindly
arranged for us by a member of the yacht club - and then visited the Holocaust
Memorial Museum. This was a moving experience, with a wealth of
background information about the oppression of Jews before WW2 and the
prevailing conditions in Germany that allowed Hitler to rise to power, as
well as the consequences of this for millions of
Jews.
Today we decided to
give museums and monuments a miss and took the subway to look at some shops at
Dupont Circle and Pentagon City. The only things we bought were a guidebook for
New York and a top-up card for our US mobile phone!
This evening Martin
& Trudy joined us at the yacht club for dinner, bringing with them the
replacement inverter which had arrived earlier in the day.