Traveling with Pam: Washington, DC

I am now only a few weeks behind in blogging!!

I have been to DC a couple of times before, but typically just for 2 – 3 days, so I never really had time to do much. This time, I wanted to take my time. I had planned on about 8 days, but ended up staying 2 weeks. I stayed at Cherry Hill RV park in College Park, Maryland. This is one of the most expensive campgrounds that I have stayed at, but it is the closest to DC and very convenient to the Metro.

If you ever get to this area, go to the Dutch Country Farmers Market in Laurel, MD (about 15 minutes from the campground). This is an Amish Farmers Market, very popular and yumm!!!! The best baked goods – fresh cheese bread, pumpkin rolls…. Smoked Chicken Wings, great salads, and of course produce and much much more!!

First a quick review of the clues I gave to this trip over the last couple of weeks.

Above was taken from the DC Metro Archives/Navy Memorial Station. Most of the underground train/metro stations had this similar look. One afternoon (obviously before rush hour) I became intrigued by the design of the ceiling and walls.

This is a small part of the Albert Einstein Memorial outside of the National Academy of Science. This is a statue that many people miss. I’ll post the whole statue in my next blog.

This sculpture is in the Hirshhorn Museum and is very realistic. It’s listed as Untitled, but has “Big Man” in parenthesis. link to Big Man info on Hirshhorn site

One of the Pandas from the National Zoo.

Above is one of several sculptures in the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial. (along with a tourist!)

The main entry hall of the Natural History museum.

Part of the Washington Memorial. The difference in shading in the marble came about because the construction was halted due to funding and the Civil War. When they started back the marble was a slightly different color.

The first day (and then again later in the trip), I went to my favorite museum, the National Museum of Natural History. I ended up spending about 5 hours here the first day. On my first trip, there were a lot of kids there. But I quickly saw that they started off downstairs (with the dinosaurs), so I went upstairs first. This worked out great because the Geology, Gems and Minerals exhibit is on the second floor – my favorite!!!!

Hope Diamond – 45.52 carats. I sent my mom a postcard and told her that they wouldn’t sell it to me so she would have to do with the picture on the postcard!

I have always liked Rhodochrosite, but did not know that it is sliced from a stalactite.

I spent hours looking at the different rocks and gems.

All types of Agates-

I had to include this since it was from Georgia. Plus it’s interesting how it was created.

They were having a special exhibit of Nature’s Best Photography, the Windland Smith Rice International Awards. I really enjoyed this exhibit. This wasn’t the winner, but probably my favorite.

I’m glad these snakes no longer exist! Titanoboa lived 60-58 million years ago, they grew to about 45 feet long, 2500 lbs. The life size replica below shows one eating an alligator.