A day was all we had to walk around DC and therefore we had to start the day early. Went over to Union Station where the subway was also located. Similar to the MRT that we were used to in Singapore, just less crowded. First stop was the White House. Alighted 3 stops later at Metro center stop, which wasn’t really close though that was the best. Once above ground, the chill began to bite with the light morning breeze blew. Suddenly we missed the tropical sun of the Caribbean. The streets were quiet on the Sunday morning as we tried to navigate with the help of street maps towards the President’s Residence.
While around location, we got confused the White House with the Treasury since they were all white and fenced up. It was weird too that there weren’t many people taking photos there and that’s when we knew we made a blunder. The White House building was pretty far away from the fence and I had to zoom in for a shot at it.
A towering obelisk stood within sight and it was something useful for us to reference to in order to walk about the huge sightseeing area close by.
With a map in view, we started southwards across the road to WWII memorial. There weren’t many tourists around but people were out and about jogging in these parks. The skies were clear blue and while we wandered about, we also yearned for the sun to rise quickly for warmth.
From the end of the reflecting pool where the WWII memorial was, we walked towards the Lincoln Memorial at the other end, enjoying the serenity of the surroundings that had the occasional choppers flying around. Seated within the pillared buidling at the end of the reflecting pool was the giant statue of Lincoln. View of the where Lincoln was sitting was impressive.
The area was huge and took a bit of walking from memorial to memorial, though quite easily accomplished with the cool weather. While walking towards Martin Luther King’s statue, we walked past the Korean War Memorial that had a couple of stone statues that looked war weary and had a eerie reflection from the glossy tiled wall.
Famous leaders of the US given the acknowledgement for their contributions and influence in shaping America, figures from the texts of history books immortalized in the various statues standing around the park. The visit also renewed interest for history.
As we walked around the central pond towards Jefferson Memorial, a sudden cold gust came about and hurried us towards the building. Within moments up the steps, a tall silhouette stood in the middle of this building which reminded me of Greek architecture. It was a good hideaway from the cold outside, especially the shop within that had heater – welcomed temporary relief.
We left the memorials and started heading to our next destination, the National Air and Space Museum. It was not close but manageable distance, and also provided the opportunity to look around this streets of DC.
There were many museums of interest in DC but we didn’t had the luxury of time. Chose this because I was interested in space related stuff. There was already a line waiting to enter the museum, and that was a tell-tale sign that we made a right choice. It was a large area consisting of many flying objects from rockets to planes to Apollo 13. Brought back the childhood interest of space exploration.
Had fast food for lunch within the museum itself, caught a IMAX movie (at a price), read up on the rich history of aviation and touch the moon rock (supposedly). Good time spent at the museum before heading out to Capitol Hill.
Capitol Hill had the grandeur of “the building” of DC, something like the Eiffel of Paris. In this near perfect blue skies, the view couldn’t be more lovely. Only issue was trying to stabilize the freezing shaking hands while shooting.
Capitol Hill was still open for visit by the time we were there though the visit was limited to a few places within the building. There was some hearing going on for the day which we went to sat in for a while. There were many people sitting in too, surprisingly. Sat in, waited for a while for people to arrive. Then some people started talking and there were some discussions and I did not understand a single bit even though it was in English. Soon after, we left for our final destination, the International Spy Museum.
The Spy Museum was kinda of an interesting visit, where we could get to be an agent, learnt the trades and see all the interesting gadgets that secret agents used. Fun.
That concluded a full day walk around the city of Washington DC. It was actually exhausting since it was really an entire day of walking. The day hadn’t ended exactly, even after having dinner at Union Station. Went back to the hotel to rest before our overnight bus ride to NYC for the New Year 2013 Countdown.