The day after Halloween, the girls had off from school. In fact, they had Friday, Monday & Tuesday off for fall break. And Sadie didn't have any soccer! At first, we thought we would take the girls to Austin for the UT game, but then we realized it was their off weekend, so we decided to make a quick weekend getaway. I have wanted to do DC with the girls for a while, but I always hear how crowded it is at spring break & in the summer, so I was hoping this would be a good time and turns out it was perfect! The weather was phenomenal while we were there - 40's at night to 60's during the day, sunny, beautiful fall foliage & the crowds were not bad at all. We flew in Friday afternoon, checked in at our hotel then headed to dinner. Afterwards, we went for a walk & stopped by a few landmarks on the way:
It was a fun way to start the trip! Then we walked back to the Wharf, which was where we were staying. It was an awesome area on the water with lots of restaurants, entertainment & a great place just to walk around & hang out every night. We may have ended up here every single night with a scoop of ice cream:
The next morning, we woke up ready to go! We decided to buy a 3-day pass on the Big Bus Tour so that would basically be our transportation the entire time we were there:
They had a stop at our hotel so we could hop on whenever we were ready to go & then they had 17 stops around the city. We hopped on & off whenever we were ready to, or we walked most of the time. First up, most of the monuments at the National Mall:
We started at the World War II Memorial - can you see the girls standing there:
Of course, the Washington Monument:
And the Lincoln Memorial:
Next, we walked over to the Vietnam's Veteran Memorial:
Did you notice the trees? Because they were BEAUTIFUL!
Next up, the Korean War Veteran's Memorial:
The girls had fun looking at the names trying to find any Dodson's or Maddux's. Or anyone from Texas, really. As we hopped back on the bus, Sophie spotted Albert Einstein:
We rode the bus across the river into Virginia to visit Arlington National Cemetery. I really remember this from when I was younger, but this trip was much more personal because Bryan had family buried here so we got to look up the burial location in the visitor's center & then we went & found it:
It is his grandmother's sister & her husband. Bryan even came to both of the funerals here when he was younger. Check out the view from their burial site. Absolutely beautiful:
We had fun walking around the cemetery because I don't think the girls have ever been to one, so it spurred on good conversation. Next, we walked to Kennedy's grave, where he has the eternal flame:
Finally, we made it to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier & we got to see the Changing of the Guard:
It's always moving, no matter how many times you see it.
When we left Virginia, we decided to head to Georgetown & we walked part of campus. One of our friends went to school here so we took a picture for him. We all thought this dorm looked like a castle:
From Georgetown, part of our tour included a water cruise, so we took the 45-minute ride from Georgetown back to the Wharf. Obviously, it was sunset when we went & it was absolutely beautiful seeing the city this time of night. We cruised by Watergate, the Kennedy Center & all of the memorials we had seen earlier:
By the time we got back to the Wharf, the girls were ready to run around & get ice cream again:
It was a long first day because the girls aren't used to touring like we do, but they had fun, learned a lot and then we went back & relaxed so we would re-group for day 2.
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