I flew into DC at Midnight:30.
My sister picked me up in her pajamas. I’d come to visit her and see DC. My parents had taken the family to the Smithsonians and monuments when we were in elementary. I remember running up down the hill of the Washington Monument with my siblings while my dad stood in line- so we had to be young enough to get away with just running up down hill to pass time. My sister has been living here for a while, but I hadn’t managed the time to visit her, but has visited Baton Rouge and New Orleans recently.
The main goal of this trip is to visit my sister and see some of the place in DC that can I appreciate, now that I’m older– the art museums, look at some interactive exhibits, etc.
Getting ready for the first day of DC, my sister packed dried fruits and granola.
Day 1: We slept in, being very tired from the flight the day before, and we left the house 3 hours later than originally planned. After a couple wrong turns and a scenic tour by the Potomac and dupont circle, we finally ended up the Mariam Koshland Science Museum (on 525 E Street) which touted interactive exhibits and hands-on activities. It did have a lot of interactivity (user-controlled menus and scroll-ball mouse-overs) but the size of the museum was comparatively small. For $3-5 a person, it was worth it. While we were there, they had a buy-one-get-one admission FourSquare check-in special.
After about 2 hours at the Mariam Koshland, which is all you’ll need to spend, we tried to find some local food. We found a couple places: Zola and Cedar, which both looked nice, but we showed up at 2:3– too late for their lunch. We decided on Teaism, a little tea cafe that served several Pan Asian dishes, like Bentos boxes, spring rolls, and naan. Splitting a large entree and a couple side dishes was enough for two: (see photos) Salmon Bento, Shrimp Rolls, and Naan.
After lunch, we ran over the National Gallery of Art, specifically for the Impressionist to Modern exhibit. It was a great exhibit, from Chester Dale’s collection, that included artists like Matisse, Monet, van Gogh, Braque, Giacometti, Picasso, and Degas. We stayed until the museum closed at 5pm, but were not finished with that single exhibit. We promised to come back the next day to finish.
To avoid rush hour traffic, we went to National Gallery sculpture garden but also had to cut the visit short, as it began to rain. We got very wet running back to the car. Most of the indoor sites were along the national mall was closed, so we drove to Union Station. It’s been turned into a Metro Station and shopping center. We sampled some vendor Pakori and drove back to my sister’s.
We had pho on my sister’s part of town and called it a day.
