A Day in Washington
The capital of the United States. Seat of the oldest democratic government. Centre of American politics. District of Columbia.
I spent yesterday walking around downtown Washington. It was barely enough to walk from the Capitol to Lincoln’s Memorial, a total distance of 3 km from end-to-end. I visited the Capitol, the Air and Space Museum, the Smithsonian Castle, WWII Memorial and Lincoln’s Memorial.
I was lucky enough to get a ticket for a tour of the Capitol. It was also one of the most secure - a thorough security check and plenty of armed police officers gave the impression that this was a well-protected building. The huge rotunda was covered with frescoes and statues of important figures in American history.
The Air and Space Museum was really fun. They had lots of material from the Apollo space program including a complete Lunar Lander and other artifacts. The Orville brothers had a gallery to themselves that celebrated their endeavours to build the first powered airplane.
What I learnt: the Smithsonian Institute was not a single building, but it actually runs ALL the museums around surrounding the Mall. And that the Mall is a broad grassy avenue lined with trees.
The other memorials were fitting monuments to America’s great presidents and to the wars that were fought. Of these, the Vietnam memorial was the most touching because of all the names of the soldiers engraved in black marble. And there were touching mementoes left for Father’s Day.
Washington may not be a big city, but it certainly has a lot to offer the visitor. I walked until I was a sunburnt, and had a blister in my foot!