When we are on a vacation or trip, Dan likes to get up early in the morning and take a walk. He often takes lots of pictures and scouts out things to go see that are not in the guidebook.
Here is the headquarters of our favorite radio station.
The lighting in the morning is just right for some beautiful shots.
Sometimes he will take a dozen shots of something trying out different exposures and angles. This is one of seven shots he took of the Washington Monument on this particular morning.
This is the side entrance to the White House. You can see the little guard station in the back where we started our White House tour, but could not take pictures.
Dan found the White House visitors center was open very early. He stopped in and bought Adam a souvenir.
When he got back, he woke Adam up and presented him with a Lego kit of the White House. Adam loves Legos. He was quite excited to build it, but decided to wait until we got home so he wouldn't lose any pieces.
We headed down to an early breakfast so we could get over to the Capitol. The breakfast buffet in our hotel was like going to Sunday brunch every morning. Adam discovered they had pineapple juice. (A note to Morgan & Lindsay - the pineapple juice was included in the breakfast buffet which was included with our room - so it was free!)
We headed back to the Capitol to see the House chambers since we had run out of time the day before. It was worth the trip back. No pictures allowed. They also do not allow water bottles - even if they have not been opened. There was an enormous garbage bin just outside the entrance that was overflowing with unopened water bottles early in the morning.
All of our tickets.
After the Capitol we stopped through the National Art Gallery. When we were here in 1999, there was a great exhibit of John Singer Sargent. There was also a beautiful Renoir painting we liked so much we bought a framed print and had it shipped home. It has hung in our home ever since. So we thought we would find these paintings. After lots of wandering about, we discovered they were not on display. But we saw many other interesting and familiar paintings.
There is Adam in the next room. The Gallery is a maze of rooms with high ceilings, natural light, wood floors and many pieces of art.
They even allow people to come in paint their version of the art.
One of the atriums. The building itself is beautiful.
We saw a little Van Gogh along the way.
Adam found Monet's "Bridge over a Pond of Water Lilies".
Our next stop was the Newseum. A museum about the news industry. Outside they have 50 newspapers displayed (just the headlines) from around the world. They change them each day.
Inside they had a sizeable piece of the Berlin Wall.
The back is a stark contrast to the graffiti covered front with which we are familiar.
This was an exhibit about an Arizona Republic newspaper reporter, Don Bolles, who was killed in a bomb blast in his car. He was killed because of a story he was investigating in Phoenix concerning land fraud and organized crime. This was very interesting to me (Michelle) because it happened less than a half mile from the house I grew up in. We actually heard the blast when it happened. My dad was assistant chief of police in Phoenix at the time and was involved in the investigation. It was big news for a long time.
They have a copy of the newspaper that incorrectly announced that Dewey defeated Truman in the presidential election. One whole room had stacks of famous headlines arranged chronologically that you could pull out and read. Each newspaper was in a case that you could easily pull out and push back as you perused the headlines.
There was a large display concerning 9/11. Just beyond Adam you can see one of the radio towers from one of the World Trade Center buildings. This was a fascinating museum. We wished we had had more time to check it out. If you are in DC, definitely put it on your list of things to see.
At the end of the day we took the last tour at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. Once again there are no pictures allowed on the tour, but we were able to take some pictures before and after. This is where our paper currency is printed (along with another site in Ft. Worth, TX).
Did you know that the Secret Service was started in 1865 for the purpose of fighting couterfeiting? We learned about how they try to stay ahead of the counterfeiters with new design and materials. We also found out that the largest bill ever printed was the $100,000 bill, but now the $100 is the largest. It was a great tour. In the picture above you can see how many $10 bills it takes to make a million dollars!
In the gift shop they had this poster to show if you stacked $100 bills, how much you would be worth. Adam would be worth almost $1.4 million dollars. Of course, we think he's priceless! The fun bit of background is that we have this exact picture of Bryce back in 1999, when he was only 3 years old - ah the memories...
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