Fillet of Fish

It rained hard all day so we tried to stay indoors as much as possible. We went into the National Museum of American History http://tinyurl.com/6eb4t7. We managed to spend 5 hours in this is newly-renovated-and-reopened-in-November museum. It is a 4-floor facility exhibiting the history of America's politics, culture and industrialization. Exhibits included the original Star-Spangled Banner, the Model-T Ford, Popular American Television Prgrams, American Presidents, Dizzy Gillespie's trumpet, steam engines, electricity, Julia Child's Kitchen (see Peter trying to get in), and even Kermit the Frog and Dorothy's Ruby Slippers! We didn't even see everything but we wanted to see the National Aquarium so we splashed thru the rain and the puddles to the Commerce Department Building which houses the Aquarium http://tinyurl.com/63d4mn in its basement. We never saw a single fish because while we were going thru the security checkpoint Peter was denied entrance because he carries a 3" pocket knife. He was very annoyed because this has never been a problem at any of the other buildings we entered. Peter said "I guess they are afraid I am going to fillet a fish!"

We decided to go to the top of the Washington Monument instead. They either didn't notice his pocket knife or they didn't have any fish to fillet because we got in without a problem.

There are some amazing views from the top of the monument, the rain hampered our experience a little, but it was still worth the 70 second elevator ride.

Finally we took the metro back to Union Station for dinner at the Center Cafe http://tinyurl.com/6jjkgn/.

Back on the metro to College Park where Kingsley was waiting for us. We are truly exhausted, crocks not withSTANDing. I don't know what shoes to wear tomorrow.

Kingsley promises to be here at 10 am for our final day in DC. Holy Crap.

Comfortable Shoes...

...well, at least I thought they were comfortable when I walked the length of the coach before we left for DC on Saturday. And they were comfortable while we were at Union Station for breakfast at the Station Grill http://www.thestationgrill.com/. The "eggs florentine" were to die for. They were comfortable as we walked to the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/index.html... the Jefferson building of the library is the most spectacular and beautiful building in Washington, and that is even before you consider the more than 17 million books to read there. (I recommended that you kick off your shoes, no matter how comfortable they are, and get an early start and make a large pot of coffee before you start reading.)

My shoes were even comfortable when I called my ITMI friend Mike and arranged to meet him all the way accross town at Dupont Circle for lunch. We took the metro there and even managed to transfer from one metro line to the other to get there, while my shoes were still bearable but getting pinchy. It was great to see Mike and hear about his adventures. Mike is a DC Guide so he was able to direct us to the Lincoln Memorial via the metro for most of the way and then via my increasingly uncomfortable shoes the rest of the way.

The Lincoln Memorial http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_Memorial at night is an incredible sight as is the Washington Monument http://tinyurl/62hthx

Today I'm wearing fur-lined crocks!!

We Have Graduated from Walmart

On this trip to Washington DC we have secured even more deluxe accomodations than Walmart parking lots. We will be spending the next four nights, no charge, in the Moose Lodge Parking Lot in College Park Maryland. We have been invited by the Moose members to partake in their "Beef & Brew" extravaganza. All the beef you can eat and all the brew you can drink. We politely declined in the interests of not having a red-meat induced stroke or a beer induced coma.

We called a taxi company to deliver us to the metro station so we could take the subway into DC. Our driver, Kingsley, has offered his services to us for the duration of our visit. He will pick us up at the Moose Lodge and take us to the metro station whenever we call him, no matter what time and when we call him in the evening he will pick us up at the Metro station and bring us back to the Moose parking lot for the modest fee of $20 a day.

Since we got a late start today we went into the city to reconnoiter the area and decide how we will tackle the next four days to maximize our site-seeing experience and find the most appealing restaurants to keep up our strength.

We walked on the mall from the Smithsonian Castle to the WWII Memorial, and took a quick spin around the dinosaur room of the American Museum of Natural History.

The picture included here is part of the WWII Memorial. The Freedom Wall is 4,000 gold stars on a wall reflected in a pool. The stars represent the 400,000 Americans who gave their lives during that war. Very impressive at night.

Heading for DC

I am "on the move" again with Peter in the motor home, this time heading for Washington DC. We are going to see as many sites as we can between Friday 11/29 and Tuesday 12/2. I will be flying home from DC on Tuesday so I can go on an overnight tour to Lancaster, PA with a group for Rendezvous Travel http://rendezvous.travel/ on December 3-4. More about that next week. For this weekend thru Tuesday check back here for more about our DC adventure.
Peter will be heading for Florida on Tuesday and then continuing on to his cross-country odyssey which will take him to Texas, California, Denver, Washington State, and Cabo San Lucas. Hopefully he will blog from his own site during that trip http://scatpayeverywhere.blogspot.com/

Judy & Liza

Yesterday I went to an event sponsored by Rendezvous Travel, http://www.rendezvous.travel/, at the Westbury Music Fair.

"The Judy & Liza Show" starred Suzanne Goulet as Liza Minelli and Julie Sheppard as Judy Garland. They performed many unforgettable songs by these two show business legends. Their characterizations were mostly very good and sometimes quite moving. Judy is one of my favorite performers and so one has a high hill to climb to impersonate her and Julie Sheppard did an excellent job. Liza is also an amazing performer (in her day) and Suzanne certainly captured her essence.


The trip took more than 35 busloads of approximately 1800 people to the show and to either lunch at the Swan Club, http://www.swanclub.com/about.htm or the Crest Hollow Country Club http://www.cresthollow.com/ or dinner at the Swan Club. It was a hugely complicated process to orchestrate but this is what Rendezvous Travel specializes in.


My duties involved shuffling people on and off buses, seating them in the theater and directing them to their tables at lunch/dinner not to mention enjoying the show.