Road Trip To York PA. A Side Trip to Washington DC Day 2 Part 3 (AKA Hamilton Tour)
06-26-2021
Robbie and I had a great morning on our Washington DC/Hamilton tour. We saw lots of things and walked lots of miles. We were exhausted, but we still had lots more to see. We went back to the hotel to freshen up and rest for a while. We planned to take the car and park either by the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial or the Jefferson Memorial. This would save us quite a bit of walking. First we drove to a Safeway to pick up a few supplies. From there we drove to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial. The parking area there was full, so we drove to the Jefferson Memorial. The parking area there is larger and had lots of spaces left. Since it was after hours, we didn’t need pay the kiosk for parking! The Jefferson and MLK memorials are basically on opposite sides of the Tidal Basin. We walked all of the way around the Tidal Basin, we started with the MLK Memorial.
Continuing around the Tidal Basin we came to the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial. This is a memorial that you don’t hear too much about. I was thinking that it must be fairly new, it’s actually been there since 1997. The memorial is really quite impressive. It covers a 7.5 acre area consisting of four sections, representing each of FDR’s four terms as president. Each area has lots of stone work and water features. There are statues depicting the depression and other prominent points of his presidency. There is a statue of FDR with his faithful companion Fala by his side.
Continuing around the Tidal Basin we arrived at a stop on our Hamilton tour, the Thomas Jefferson memorial. The memorial was undergoing a partial renovation but we were able to enter to see the Jefferson statue. We were able to get a nice sunset view of the Washington Monument from the portico, also on the Hamilton tour.
We had enough time to visit two more locations. We got back in the car and moved to the MLK parking area, everyone there had left by this time. We were heading to the Lincoln Memorial, on the way we wanted to stop at the Korean War Veterans memorial. Robbie’s father is a Korean War Veteran. It’s a pretty impressive memorial with a life size bronze platoon in formation crossing rice paddies. The lighting at night make the soldiers look pretty spooky. We were disappointed to see that the memorial was undergoing a total restoration; we were not able to see it in all of its glory. We did visit the memorial a few years ago on our last visit to DC. We continued on to the Lincoln Memorial, probably everyone’s favorite memorial. I always remember visiting it when I was a kid. We climbed the steps to see the huge statue of Lincoln. We like to walk around the to the back to view the Potomac River. There is always the awesome view of the National Mall and the Washington Monument. It is even better at night.
My little Fujifilm X100V was working out great! It was very easy to carry around and I was traveling much lighter. I normally only carry one camera and one lens anyway, but it was much lighter. I got some really nice twilight images. For the twilight images, I was using my monopod. With my big Nikon, I would have needed to use my tripod. In DC, you can’t use tripods in the monuments.
We made our way back to the car and then to the hotel. We had a very long day! We ended up logging 30,000 steps, over 13 miles!
The next morning we had a long 12 hour drive back to Florida. We took turns driving, had a nice lunch stop, and several stops for gas. We made it home around midnight.
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Road Trip to York PA. A side trip to Washington DC. Day 2 part 2 (AKA Hamilton Tour)
06-26-2021
Robbie and I found a nice pizzeria and sat down for a nice long relaxing lunch. We were very hot, tired and thirsty. Feeling very refreshed from our lunch, we got back to sightseeing. We heard that there was a Freedom Ride rally on the National Mall. We headed to the National Mall to see what was going on. There were lots of people with red shirts, even a few horses. We hung out there for a while and listened to a few speakers.
We went from the rally to the Capitol Building. It was disappointing to see the Capitol Building surrounded by a security fence. It was nice seeing the Capitol Building, fence and all. The fence has recently been removed.
Our next stop was on the list of monument to Hamilton characters. The Library of Congress: James Madison Memorial Building. Madison was one of the first people to indicate a need for congress to have a library. He suggested a list of books that would be helpful to members of congress. Inside the main hall of the Madison Building there is a statue of James Madison. Unfortunately, due to covid, all of the federal buildings were closed to the public. There was a very nice capitol police officer at the door. He informed us that we were not allow to enter. Robbie asked him if he would take a photo of the Madison statue for us. He said yes! So he took Robbie’s phone inside and took a few photos of the statue for us. We were very grateful and thanked him for taking the photos for us. We didn’t tell him about our Hamilton tour but we did mention the other reason that we wanted to see the Madison statue. James Madison and I are “cousins” or something like that. My Grandmother was a Madison from Virginia, apparently her family goes back to James Madison’s uncle. So James Madison and I share a great grandfather.
Our next stop was another one on the Hamilton tour, the Jefferson Library of Congress Building. Unfortunately also closed. This is the main building for the Library of Congress. We were able to go inside on our last visit to DC a few years ago. It’s a very beautiful building!
The Supreme Court Building is next to the Library of Congress. It was closed as well but was also barricaded at the street. We also went inside of the Supreme Court Building on our last trip to DC. It would have been nice just to walk up the steps though. From there you get a good view of the back of the Capitol Building.
They call it Capitol Hill, because the Capitol Building is on a hill. It doesn’t look like a big hill, until you walk to the top of it! We are from Florida, so the biggest hill we have is an ant hill. Walking up and down Capitol Hill made us quite tired. We planned on using the car for the next places on our list. So we headed back to the Hotel to take a break before heading back out. About half way to the hotel we took a little break at the fountain for the National Botanical Garden.
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Road Trip to York PA. A side trip to Washington DC. Day 2 part 1(AKA Hamilton Tour)
06-26-2021
My wife Robbie and I took a road trip to York PA to see my family. It was great seeing everyone again, we really missed them a lot! We had a great visit but it was time to head home. We planned on visiting Washington DC on the way back to Florida. We spent two nights in DC, this way we would have one full day to see all of the sights. We had a very full day planned, we wanted to see everything! We wanted to visit some of the Smithsonian museums while we were there. In the past, you pretty much just walked into the museum you wanted to visit. During our visit in June, because of the covid pandemic, they were restricting the number of people visiting each museum. To control this we needed to get a free admission ticket online, 30 days in advance! Unfortunately, we started planning our trip less than 30 days before. We were unable to get any museum admission tickets. According to the website they were holding a small number of tickets for walk ups. We wanted to see the new National Museum of African American History and Culture. It was under construction during our last visit a few years ago. We planned on being there in the morning when they opened. On the way there we took the scenic route through the Mary Livingston Ripley Garden next to the Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building. There was a line of people waiting to get into the African American Museum. We asked the woman who was checking tickets if there were any left for today. She said that there were no more tickets for today. She told us that to get tickets the day of, you actually needed to go to the website the day before at 4:30 to get them. So we were unable to get tickets for any of the museums. I checked recently and it looks like you no longer need to get a ticket to enter the museums.
Robbie is a huge Hamilton fan, so while we were in Washington DC we also wanted to see all of the monuments to Hamilton characters. Alexander Hamilton was the first Secretary of the Treasury. The US Treasury Building is just a few blocks from the African American Museum, so this was our next stop. There is a statue of Hamilton at the rear of the building. This also seems to be the main entrance, there is a security fence with a guardhouse there. We were only able to see the Hamilton statue from a distance. In the front of the building along Pennsylvania Ave is a Statue of Albert Gallatin, the longest serving Secretary of the Treasury.
Walking from the back of the Treasury Building to the front, we passed the Sun Trust Building. It’s just a neat old red brick building.
Walking down Pennsylvania Ave, we came to Lafayette Square. There is a statue of the Marquis de Lafayette, a good friend of Hamilton and French ally who helped win the American Revolutionary War. One of the men at the base of the statue is Comte de Rochambeau. Rochambeau and his French army were instrumental in defeating the British at Yorktown and winning the Revolutionary War. He is mentioned in Hamilton at the battle of Yorktown.
Across Pennsylvania Ave from Lafayette Square is The White House. There were barricades along Pennsylvania Ave, so we could not cross the street.
We were able to get into The White House for a photo though! No, not really. We stopped at The White House gift shop down the street to do some shopping. With our purchases, we could go around the corner to a small studio, for a free photo in a faux White House.
Heading back down Pennsylvania Ave we came to Pershing Park, sort of a two for one memorial. It honors General Pershing on one half and World War One on the other. The artwork reflecting in the pool will be replaced by a bronze mural when it’s completed. It’s a really pretty memorial.
We were getting pretty tired and hungry from walking around seeing the sights. We found a nice pizzeria and had a long relaxing lunch. The pizzeria was just around the corner from Fords Theater and the Peterson House across the street. The Peterson House is where President Abraham Lincoln died after being shot in Fords Theater. After seeing Fords Theater we walked across Pennsylvania Ave and got a good view of the Capitol Building. We were in Washington in June, it was Pride Month, the Federal buildings were flying pride flags. This one was the Commerce Building.
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Road Trip to York PA. A Side Trip to Washington DC.
06-25-2021
Robbie and I had a great time in York PA visiting the family. It was awesome seeing everyone again. We missed them a lot! It’s always nice getting back to York. Hopefully it wont be so long until we get back again. It was time to say goodbye and head back home. It’s a really long drive back to Florida. To break it up a little, we planned a side trip to Washington DC. One of Robbie’s favorite cities. On our way from Florida to York we stopped at Mount Vernon. By the time we arrived it was too late to take a tour. We decided that we would stop at Mount Vernon again on our way to Washington. This time we arrived with plenty of time to take a tour. Due to covid restrictions they were limiting the number of people allow to take a tour of the inside of George Washington’s mansion. Although we could still walk around the grounds and see the farm and the mansion from the outside, they had reached the limit for tours of the inside of the mansion for the day. The admission to Mt. Vernon is fairly expensive. Since we could not see the inside of the mansion, we decided not to take a tour. There is a nice restaurant there next to the gift shop so we had a good lunch before heading into Washington.
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We had booked a room in downtown DC at the Holiday Inn. It was just three blocks from the National Mall, just behind the Air and Space Museum. This was a great location, most of the things we wanted to see were within walking distance. Our rate included come and go parking privileges for the parking garage, very important when visiting DC by car. The hotel was really nice, our room was on the top floor. The room was fairly large and had a sitting area with a sofa. There was also a refrigerator that we made good use of. Along with a view of the inner courtyard we could just see the top of capital dome from our window. There was a rooftop pool, but due to covid, it was closed.
I wanted to see how my new little Fujifilm X100V performed for travel photography. The X100V is a very small camera and easy to carry around. Although it is a small camera, it has all of the features and capabilities of a larger camera, with one, well, two exceptions. The X100V has a the smaller C size sensor (lots of big DSLR cameras have C sized sensors too, so not much of an issue) and a fixed 23mm focal length lens, equivalent to a 35mm focal length lens on my full frame size sensor Nikon (sensor size affects the focal length). I normally use a 24-70mm zoom lens on my Nikon. So the 35mm equivalent focal length lens on the X100V is in the middle of the range that I’m used to using. I was eager to see how being tied to the fixed 35mm (equivalent) focal length would affect my photography. There was still lots of daylight left, so I thought I would walk around and take some photos. When I photograph a place like Washington DC, if I have time, I like to walk around and sort of just follow my nose. I usually have a few things that I want to photograph, but I like to keep things loose. I like to also be able to photograph things that I find along the way. Here, my main targets were the Capitol building and the Washington Monument. If I found something along the way, all the better. I walked a few blocks from the hotel on the way to the Capitol building and found the National Museum of the American Indian. This museum has some really nice architecture. I was having a great time photographing it. This museum was not on my list of places to photograph. Not having a strict itinerary allowed me to spend some time on a found place. Tomorrow will be much different, we have a larger list of places to see, so I won’t have as much time for found places.
After photographing the American Indian Museum, I made my way towards the Capitol Building. It was a really nice evening for a walk through the Nation’s Capital. It was disheartening to see the security fencing around the Capitol Building. The reason why it needed to be there in the first place is even more disheartening. Area closed is not something you want to see around your Capitol. That aside, the Capitol Building was looking very majestic as usual. Thankfully the security fencing has since been removed.
I walked all the way around the Capitol Reflecting Pool then started down the National Mall. There was not a large number of people on the Mall. The people who were on the Mall had been taking part in many activities. They were sitting in the grass relaxing and enjoying the beautiful evening. People were walking, taking in the sights, like me. They were playing games and having fun. Bike riders and rental electric scooter riders were zipping up and down the Mall. A Segway tour passed by. There were people sitting on benches just watching the world go by. It was a great evening to be on the Mall. I was treated to a colorful sunset as I approached the Washington Monument.
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On my way back to the hotel I stumbled onto the Mary Livingston Ripley Garden. The garden is a beautifully landscaped brick walkway between Jefferson Drive and Independence Avenue. It’s part of the gardens surrounding the Smithsonian Arts and Industries building, the prominent 1800s redbrick building along the National Mall. The Air and Space Museum was undergoing a renovation and had construction fencing around parts of it. I poked my camera through the fence and I was able to get a photo of the Delta Solar sculpture. Just a block from the hotel I passed the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial with a nice view of the Capital Building. I had fun walking around the Nations Capital taking photos. I was very happy with the performance of my little Fujifilm X100V. Occasionally I needed to reposition myself to frame an image. With my 24-70mm I would have been able to simply zoom. For the most part thought I was working well with the fixed focal length. The camera was really nice to carry around, I felt very light and free. I just had the small camera, with an extra battery and lens cloth in my pocket.
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