Random Thoughts - Washington, DC

Day 13 – Moored, Washington, DC Each day in Washington, DC convinced us that we'd only be able to see a small part of what was offered, but still, we were determined to see as much as we could. Here are a few random pics of things we saw and a summary of what impressed us the most.

No tour of Washington, DC is complete without at least a peek at the White House. Tours must be booked months in advance, but just a walk by 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue was good enough for us. Security was pretty tight. No one waved or invited us in for tea, so we kept on moving.

Not far from the White House, opposite the modern Reagan International Trade Building is the old Post Office Building which is pretty impressive. The old and new seem to blend well.

We were out and about for lunch each day and enjoyed varied ethnic dishes from the lunch wagons that line the streets along the National Mall. One day we tried sandwiches and salads at Potbelly Sandwich Shop (good food/good prices) and another sunny day we sat at outside at umbrella'ed tables with our lunches from Paul (good, but pricey). Our thrifty, tired selves had us drinking wine and eating dinner aboard Nine of Cups each night.

The Neoclassic architectural style of the city is grand, but the classic embellishments always catch my attention … griffins,gargoyles, gods, goddesses and other mythical creatures, all sitting sentry on rooftops and hanging out on corners and above windows.

One evening at the end of our DC adventure, I asked David and Paul for the three things they liked most about Washington. David's response was the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, Museum of American History and Museum of Natural History. Paul's favorites were the Hirshhorn Museum, the Museum of American History and the National Gallery. Mine was the Library of Congress, the National Gallery and the Sculpture gardens at both the National Gallery and the Hirshhorn. Despite our diverse tastes, we agreed we enjoyed it all, but would have loved more time to better absorb all we saw. I guess that means we need to return to Washington again. There still so much to see … but now it's time to go.

The Money Factory and Fine Art

Day 12 – Moored, Washington, DC Our time in DC was coming to an end all too soon, but there was still so much left to see. We talked about our options and ended up arranging a free tour at the BEP … Bureau of Engraving & Printing, aka The Money Factory. We showed up early and waited in line until it was our turn for a tour. The BEP building itself is grand ...

… but the entrance for the tour was unremarkable and easy to miss.

An introductory exhibit gave some history as well as displaying a million dollars in 10s. Quite the stash, we thought.

The 40-minute tour started with a video and then we were led through the various steps in currency production with sidebars about the paper, ink, security measures, etc. No photos were allowed for obvious reasons. They had lots of clever posters on the walls … “The buck STARTS here.” “We make money the old-fashioned way … we print it.” The final stop was the gift shop where we had the opportunity to buy shredded dollars and all things greenback-oriented and dollar oriented. We were most impressed with Woodrow Wilson on the $100,000 bill. We were told, however, that the largest bill printed and in circulation these days is the $100. All in all, compared to what we'd seen and experienced thus far in DC, this tour was pretty lackluster.

Enough money … it was time for some fine art. We headed to the National Gallery of Art, America's national art museum, not part of the Smithsonian. This is not a place to whiz through, but with limited time available, we cheated and sought out some highlights brochures from the the Visitor's Desk. We wanted to take in everything we could. Only the West Building was open … grand and elegant … candy for the eye.

The Neoclassic architectural style, so prevalent in most of DC's 1930-40s buildings, is impressive inside and out. We entered through the Rotunda, all polished marble columns and floors and worked our way first to the West Garden Court. We wandered through the centuries of artists, gazing and pondering. The early artwork from 14th century was primarily religious in nature.

“The Gallery's collection of paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, medals, and decorative arts traces the development of Western Art from the Middle Ages to the present, including the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas.” Worthy of our ooohs and aaahs.

My art history knowledge is admittedly limited and rusty, but names like Giotto, Raphael, Rembrandt, Toulouse-Lautrec, Gauguin, Renoir, Vermeer, Monet and Manet rang a distinct bell. Here they all were, assembled and beautifully displayed for the world to see and share. Awesome!

We were enthralled with an artist who was at work copying Mary Cassatt's “Girl Arranging Her Hair”. She was doing quite a credible job.

Once again, digesting it all became an issue for us. We lapsed into fine art overload. So much to see and absorb as we breezed through, ticking off the world's master artists as we went. We stopped ourselves and decided we'd rather take a miss on some pieces and more fully appreciate what we did have time to see.

We moved outside to the Sculpture Garden for a look. Lovely! Graceful, curving walking paths led us to wondrous artwork around each corner and tucked into nooks and crannies waiting to be discovered. Fanciful, modern, contemporary, realistic, trompe l'oeil … it was great.

As the day ebbed, we made our way back to Nine of Cups. It was nearing our time to leave Washington, DC and prepare for our passage back to Chesapeake. So much to see and always, always, always so little time.

Smithsonian's Museums - the WOW Factor

Day 11 – Moored, Washington, DC

Each day that we've gone out exploring, we've been visiting one of the Smithsonian's museums. According to the Smithsonian Survival Guide (free/$1 donation), the Smithsonian Institution includes 19 museums, the National Zoo, 9 research centers and 12 public gardens. Seven of the museums plus the National Gallery of Art and several public gardens surround the National Mall. We decided which ones held mutual interest and visited those first. As with most national sights in Washington, DC, entrance to all the museums is free.

The Smithsonian Castle seemed the logical place to start, but we didn't start there. (Logic...schmogic!) That said, it's where my blog post starts. The building was completed in 1855, and the museum's entire collection was originally housed here. The Castle is now the Visitor's Center and the Smithsonian icon. An interesting note … James Smithson (1765-1829) was a very wealthy English scientist. He bequeathed his entire fortune to his nephew with the provision that if his nephew died without heirs, his fortune would go to the United States “for the creation of an institution dedicated to the increase and diffusion of knowledge” in Washington, DC. More interesting? Smithson never set foot in the USA. He is buried in a crypt in the Castle...the only person to be interred on the National Mall.

Now … on to the museums …

The Air & Space Museum was highest on both David and Paul's list, so we visited there first. This museum details the history of flight. The museum boasts more than 50,000 artifacts, plus a planetarium and an IMAX theater.  We tagged along on a guided tour of the highlights of the museum which took us from Icarus to space travel and everything in between. Talk about mind-boggling! The highlights were Wilbur & Orville Wright's 1903 Flyer, Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis, lunar space landing vehicles, rockets, jets … if it flew or flies, it's probably here.

Lucky for us, the Wright Brothers were home and consented to having their picture taken with us. Timing's everything.

I had voted for the Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden and since it was just across the street from Air & Space, we headed there next. The Hirshhorn is a circular, drum-shaped building with an outdoor plaza and a sunken sculpture garden. It concentrates on international modern and contemporary art and reminded us very much of Tasmania's MONA.

We convinced David to pose next to Big Man (artist: Ron Mueck) to give some perspective to the sculpture's size.

Moving right along, we visited the Natural History museum on two consecutive days and still didn't see it all. The museum houses the largest natural history collection in the world and we were once again overwhelmed by all we saw. Henry, the elephant, greeted us in the main hall on arrival. His ivory tusks were too heavy to mount (80# each), so he's had to manage with fiberglass tusks all these years.

Like every other museum at the Smithsonian, the exhibits were informative, provocative and fascinating. We saw a T-Rex skull and a triceratops skeleton, cave paintings, a giant squid, mummies, hordes of animals and marine life and a whole gallery dedicated to our prehistoric ancestors.  And, the Hope Diamond was on display … all 45.52 carats of it.

The American History Museum contains three floors of all that's American. We were particularly enthralled with a gallery entitled American Stories. Dorothy's ruby slippers were on display, as were first ladies' gowns, Mohammed Ali's gloves, Bert & Ernie, Edison's light bulb, Lincoln's top hat, the golden spike for the completion of the Transcontinental railroad, the Star-Spangled Banner and Ben Franklin's walking stick, among other memorabilia.

With so many galleries and exhibits to choose from, we had to choose carefully which to visit. We had finally come to the conclusion, we couldn't see everything … not enough time and not enough brain cells to digest it all. We chose two more galleries, On the Water (of course) and America on the Move, a history of transportation in the USA.  David was particularly interested in the Gunboat Philadelphia, a Revolutionary War era gunboat, that was sunk early in the war and only recently discovered, recovered and brought to the Smithsonian. All three were excellent choices and we learned a lot, but our minds were full to the brim when we left.

The African American History and Culture Museum opened with great celebration while we were in DC. The lines were long and we opted to wait until our next visit to check out this museum. Good thing, because we couldn't take in many more museums.

We were so impressed with all we saw, we became members of the Smithsonian. What better way to show our gratitude for such a stupendous institution.

There's still more DC to share. David's Blue View will take precedence tomorrow, then on Sunday we'll report about our visit to the Money Factory and the National Gallery of Art. Check it out.