Trip to Maryland/DC - Part 2 - Inside the Smithsonian

So here's part 2 of my series on my trip to Maryland/DC.  On our 1st morning in DC after arriving, we mosied on over to the Natural History Museum at the Smithsonian, because Thor really wanted to check it out.  I've never been to any of the museums in the complex so I thought it was a good place to start.

It was about a 15 minute walk - luckily not raining at that point.  And we reached the museum about 15 minutes early.  We plunked down in the lobby and waited for the doors to open.  Here's a pic of the exterior...it's a BIG building.

Once the museum opened, we booked into the gift shop for our standard souvenirs of pressed pennies, a guide book to the complex and a bottle of water.  Then it was off to the rotunda to see this guy!

Let's call him Gerry.  Then to appease the little kid in both of us it was off to the dinosaur exhibit.  Fossils, bones, and skeletons...oh MY!  Here are a few of the specimins that caught our eyes and our flashbulbs...the fluorescent lights created some interesting photo effects.

And then a short stop in the Gem Exihibit for those of us that drool at the sight of ginourmous colored stones (me), and rock formation hounds (Thor).  An attempt was made to capture a pic of the Hope diamond although the new, temporary setting I thought was way overdone and not that impressive.  I mean it's the Hope diamond - dark blue, amazing, stunning...and surrounding it with hundreds of colorless diamonds and then placing it under fluorescent lights just made it....kinda meh.  But here it is anyway.

And then after lunch and another hour or so browsing about - we called it a day and went out the opposite entrance toward the Smithsonian Castle and the Capitol Mall.  The castle was stunning and I wish we'd had time to poke in...but it started raining pretty heavily and we needed to make a run for it back to our hotel to check out and mosey toward Annapolis.

In the next installment, we'll be in Annapolis and Chesapeake Bay.

Maryland Trip - Weekend in DC, part 1

I promised you all pics of my trip and I'm determined to follow through.  So here are some pics of our weekend in DC.

It rained all weekend which put a kabosh on some of the outdoor activities we had planned, and limited our pics.  Didn't make it to the Lincoln Memorial or the Capitol Building or some of the other museums at the Smithsonian...but it was fun nonetheless.

Through Thor's many many many Priority Club points we got our hotel in DC for free.  We stayed at the Crowne Plaza which was 4 blocks from the White House.  Tried to get pics of the White House, but we seemed to have shown up on a school trip Friday...so droves and droves of teenagers were milling about in front of the gates...which made for iffy pic taking.  The hotel was amazing!  With great views of the city.

We walked around the city for a bit the first night, but rain started really coming down and we didn't bring the umbrella.  So we had dessert at the hotel and called it a night. 

Next morning we went out to the Smithsonian bright and early - and had to wait around for a half hour until they opened.  Got a few shots of DC on the way there.

Shots of the Capitol Building, the Washington Monument and the Treasury Building.

 Washington Monument

So that's it for Part 1 of the DC weekend, post on the Smithsonian and Natural History Museum soon with more pics.  We also made a stop in Annapolis to see Chesapeake Bay and visit the East Coast campus of Thor's college, St. Johns.  Gorgeous campus, exactly what I always envisioned a college campus was supposed to look like when I was a kid. 

Look for that in the next few days!