Washington, DC & The Great Smoky Mountains–Day 3-Downtown DC

On Tuesday, we headed out pretty early to beat some of the DC traffic and get parking at the Reagan Building (which the kids thought was a shopping mall and absolutely beautiful). Once we were parked, we walked to the Mall then towards the Capitol.

It was pretty warm and by the time we got there, we were good to stay on the west side of the water and get pictures of the Capitol across the pool. We didn’t plan on touring the Capitol on this trip, but wanted to make sure to see it.

From the Capitol, we walked to the Air and Space Museum and arrived just after it opened.

Much of our time here was spent with Ben pointing out something amazingly cool that he found.

We saw the Spirit of St. Louis.

Got to sit on a bench that modeled plane seat sizes.

The Spirit of St. Louis from the second floor.

The Wright Flyer. Ben and Rosemary were looking forward to seeing this one.

We checked out some space flight stuff, too, and even walked through a Skylab.

By the time we saw all that we wanted to see, it was time for lunch. We headed to the museum’s McDonalds. It was pretty much empty. The day after Labor Day is apparently a great time to travel. We grabbed a quick bite then we were off to the next stop…

The National Gallery of Art

I was very excited to show the kids great works of art in real life. First stop, Leonardo da Vinci.

The entire time in this museum I was terrified Charlotte was going to set off an alarm. Of the three, she was the least enthusiastic about this stop.

Rembrandt

Vermeer

David’s Napoleon in His Study (which Rosemary recognized from our dictionary)

Constable

Another by Constable with beautifully fluffy clouds.

Several artists were doing studies of the works.

Lots of Monets

We also saw works by Degas, Picasso, Matisse, and Van Gogh. I wanted them to see works by artists we learned about last year and that we would learn about this year. It was a quick stop. There’s a lot of art there and for three young kids, it can be overwhelming. One of the kids kept asking if all there was in the building was rooms with painting. They all also seemed perplexed as to why so many people were naked in the paintings. That was fun to explain…

So, from the National Gallery, we walked over to the National Archives.

We didn’t take any photos inside, but this was definitely a highlight of the day. There was no line, so we walked right up to see the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights. After that, we walked around the museum portion and stopped to pick up an ornament from the gift shop. The museum was great with kids, and since so few people were out, we practically had it to ourselves. We looked at documents about the Titanic disaster, the Challenger, the Magna Carta, and the Emancipation Proclamation. On the way into the city, we’d been listening to a Jim Weiss audio recording about Abraham Lincoln and had just learned about the Emancipation Proclamation, so that was a cool connection.

Next stop was the Natural History Museum.

Of all the places we visited, this one seemed the busiest. The dinosaur exhibit was closed for renovations, but we did get to see lots of animals and check out the gem stones.

The American History Museum was our last museum of the day. We wanted to make sure to see the Star Spangled Banner and the transportation exhibit.

We hadn’t seen the flag since it was moved to its new display. We have a book about Francis Scott Key and the writing of the poem, so our kids had an interest in seeing the flag, too.

The kids really enjoyed exploring the transportation area. Ben still loves trains.

They liked riding the “L”

We also took a gander at the maritime exhibit before picking up a few things from the gift shop. Charlotte had finally given into her exhaustion and napped quite contentedly in the stroller while Ben, Rosemary, and I shopped.

We left the museum as it was closing to head and grab a bite to eat. We still wanted to see some of the monuments before calling it a day.

We got burgers at Ollie’s Trolley

So nice to sit down for a while.

Waking back up

After we finished eating, we walked up to the White House. This was right before the fence jumper incident, so I’m not sure if we could have gotten this close if it had been after that.

Next, we walked across the Ellipse to the Washington Monument. Going up to the top is one of the main things we didn’t do that is on the list to make sure we do next time. By the time we made it here, it was closed.

It was around this point in time that Jonathan checked his phone and noticed some rain heading our way. Since we still wanted to see the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, we decided to try to get to the Lincoln (just under a mile away) before the rain began.

Instead of stopping at the WWII Memorial, Jonathan just took a quick photo as we walked by. Rosemary walked, but I put Ben on my back for awhile and Jonathan kept pushing Charlotte so we could get there faster. We could see the dark clouds inching closer and closer.

As we reached the bottom of the steps, Jonathan closed up the stroller, handed me Charlotte, scooped up Ben, and we made a mad dash to shelter. The first drops fell as we got to the top. We weren’t the only ones planning to ride out the rain at the Lincoln, but we did find a place to sit out on the colonnade and watched the storm blow over the city.

Jonathan took this photo shortly after we got to the top of the stairs and you can see the dark clouds inching their way to the east.

While we watched the storm roll through, we first saw the Capitol disappear from our view, then as the rain grew harder, the Washington Monument also disappeared. We knew the end of the rain was near once they both came back into view.

Before heading down, we looked around inside.

The storm made its way to the east.

Once we made it down, it was starting to get dark and we had another mile or so walk ahead of us to the Jefferson.

On the way we visited the Martin Luther King, Jr Memorial.

We also saw the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial

Between FDR and the Jefferson, the heavens opened again and we weren’t close enough to the Jefferson to get out of the rain. We thought we found some shelter at the George Mason statue, but alas, it didn’t keep us dry. Eventually we made it to the Jefferson, looking a bit like drowned rats, but we made it! Our first stop once there was the bathroom to attempt to dry off. No paper towels, just air dryers. It helped some.

We took the elevator up and finally saw the statue. Charlotte was convinced we were looking at a statue of George Washington.

It was about 8:30pm at this point and it was still raining. Jonathan valiantly ran (literally) to go get the car at the Reagan building and pick the kids and me up at the Jefferson. Once he left, Charlotte had to go to the bathroom, so we went back downstairs via the elevator, then came back up to look around a bit more.

A last photo through the rain of the Washington Memorial from the Jefferson.

Soon, Jonathan was there with the van and we wrapped up our 12 hour day.

Throughout it all, the kids had great attitudes and were eager to see all the sites, Rosemary and Ben especially. I loved watching Rosemary snap shots with her camera throughout the day. And Ben has a memory like a steel trap and soaked in so much information. Charlotte would have been happy to skip out on the art museum, but otherwise, even at 3, she was a great little tourist. Looking forward to many more trips like this with the kids.