The Tri-City Tour - Washington

Ok, so we're having our first travel hitch and the van is not ready for pick up. However it gives us an ideal opportunity to update you on the first leg of our trip - Washington / Philadelphia / Boston by Greyhound bus.

Washington
Someone asked us what we thought of Washinton and our response was "erm...well...bit boring really".  Don't get us wrong there sure is a lot to see.  The trouble is it's a city designed for government and kind of reflects the official 'suits' who work there. Very clean and tidy - a place for everything and everything in it's place - but it lacks the character of a city that has evolved.  There's lots of open spaces but that also means everything is spread out and in temperatures of 104degrees (we kid you not!) that's punishing.

Our first night in Washington there was a tremendous storm with hurricane force winds. Trees down, power out over a large portion of DC and the surrounding area, it topped the news for several days.  Embarrassed to say we were completely oblivious and slept all the way through it!  Not to be put off we headed out on the local bus from Georgetown to The Mall.  The decimation there was clear to see.  Trees and debris everywhere, festival tents collapsed, fences down, etc.  Can't believe we didn't hear a thing.

We had two objectives for Washinton - The Lincoln Memorial (Lynne) and The Whitehouse (Trevor)

Lynne "When we started planning this trip the image of myself at Lincoln's feet came to represent this trip for me.   As we walked up The Mall towards the memorial I got kind of nervous with what some friends of mine would recognise as 'gig jitters'.  It's an impressive memorial and good old Abe appears kind of sad looking out over that momentous time in American history. Amazing to think it was only completed in 1922.  Got my dream picture and it was quite an emotional moment"

Having walked almost the length of  The Mall in the early morning we then opted for one of the hop on/hop off open top bus tours to get around for a couple of days. At a weekend everyone in DC is a tourist so it was a busy couple of days.  It's a city of monuments, museums and sculptures.  Our favourite sculpture was of Albert Einstein - you can sit on his lap!

We had an enjoyable trip on the river which gives you a different perspective of the city.  Unlike most major cities it has no skyscrapers.  15 stories is as high as it goes - by law. The last place that we visited was The Whitehouse which was Trevor's photo shoot dream.

Trevor "It's such an iconic building, you just have to go see it. Good to see they've looked after the place since we set fire to it in the war of 1812. The fire damage is the reason they painted it white you know.  Had hoped to share this historical titbit with some American cousins but sadly no-one asked and Lynne forbade me from announcing it to all and sundry...something to do with a Secret Service guy standing about 10 feet away.  Got my photo though, it's a close as you can get as a non US citizen"

We'll be making a little slideshow of the rest of our pictures.  By the way - what do you think of Trevor's newly grown beard?   We'll be seeing how it develops over the next few months.