Washington D. C. - Day One

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Sunday, 7 June:
We woke up in plenty of time for our shuttle, so after the morning necessities, we were on our way to our first day of touring Washington D.C. There were about 12 other KOA folks on the shuttle. We arrived at our drop off point near the Capitol Building and decided to look for coffee before boarding the Tourmobile, but ended up touring the Museum of the American Indian for almost two hours. The place was quite fascinating, to the point that we had to drag ourselves away so we could see other sights. I did get my coffee there though. From the museum, we headed back to our drop off point to hop on the Tourmobile. We wanted to get a better idea of what to see, so we took over half the loop before getting off at the Lincoln Memorial. The bus tour guide was very informative and easy to listen to. It took us a while to find the restrooms since the map seemed to indicate they were located on the Potomac side somewhere. We ended up finding them inside the basement of the memorial! After checking out the Lincoln Memorial, where Manoli picked up another of her ever-growing collection of pins, we hopped back on the bus for Union Station where we’d heard they had a lot of dining options. By this time, it was 2pm and we were getting hungry. On a side note, the Museum of the American Indian has a cafeteria that offers a great selection of interesting native dishes from all over North, Central, and South America, at very reasonable prices considering how special they were. BBQ Buffalo anyone? We ended up eating at the Akropolis Greek Restaurant in Union Station. Manoli had a vegetarian gyro which she couldn’t come close to finishing and I had a mousaka platter that was humongous and quite tasty. By this time, it was after 4pm, so we headed back to pick up our KOA shuttle, taking pictures along the way. At the Capitol Building, we watched a tour group riding those “IT” things made by Segway I think. It looked like a lot of fun! Returning to the KOA, we went to the nearby Wawa gas station for some coffee, ten to Wal-Mart for some fruit and a cordless mouse for the laptop. Dinner was fruit, leftovers, and a small blueberry pie from Wal-Mart. Tonight we’ll figure out our priorities for our second day of touring D.C.

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Photos

Capitol Building
The Capitol Building with Miss Liberty in front.

Sorrowful Liberty
A statue of Miss Liberty in front of the Capitol Building. She is crying over all the dead in the Civil War.

Museum of the American Indian
A view of the interesting architecture of the Museum of the American Indian

Museum of the American Indian Collage
A collage of some of the exhibits inside the Museum of the American Indian.

Tourmobile
Our Tourmobile loading.

Jefferson Memorial
A view of the Jefferson Memorial as the Tourmobile approaches it.

Lincoln Memorial
A nice view of the Lincoln Memorial.

Washington Monument & Manoli
Manoli posing in front of the reflection pond with the Washington Monument.

Abraham Lincoln
The statue of Abraham Lincoln inside the Lincoln Memorial.

Union Station
An outside view of Union Station

Inside Union Station
Just one of the beautiful areas inside Union Station.

The Capitol Building
The classic view of the Capitol Building.

Segway Quartet
Four of the members of a Segway tour leaving the Capitol Building.