Washington, DC

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Originally I was gonna stay with another 2p2er here, but thanks to an evil GPS which sent us in the wrong direction, I ended up missing my bus and the timing didn't work out in the end. Instead, I arrived at 5am and made my way to the hostel which was small and shabby but very cosy and friendly. There weren't any staff there so I just curled up on a couch in the common room and slept until about 10am when they arrived. T

he first day I went to do the typical touristy sight seeing that is inevitably going to happen in Washington. After seeing the White House (which really isn't anything special, you can't even go very close.. The only interesting thing about it was the sniper on the roof I managed to take a picture of) I checked out the national mall (which isn't actually a mall, just a big park type thing with lots of interesting stuff in). Walking from one end, which takes a lot longer than i realised, I saw the Lincoln monument (a stone Lincoln sat in his throne, overlooking the big long pool thing - the famous scene of Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech), the Washington monument and then onto the Smithsonian Institution. The Smithsonian is a group of free Museums, and there I met up with Johannes, a german guy I met in Chicago. We checked out the Air & Space Museum and the Natural History museum (which were both really interesting, and funnily enough the first museums I'd been to after over 2 months of being in the states), then I retired to the hostel to relax. Sightseeing is EXHAUSTING, especially when you are walking about all day, and even more so when it's really really hot and humid like the east coast is at this time of year. In the evening I hung out with a bunch of British guys who were staying at the hostel, as well as a Californian and 2 Germans. We either hung out on the Porch or headed into the basement to play Pool or Table Football (one of the Germans was really really good at it, like crazy good, apparently he's the best in his hometown in Germany and goes to tournaments and stuff. He also had a liver problem that meant when he drank just 1 beer he got really drunk, which was pretty amusing.)

The next day I just hung out at the hostel with a different group of Brits, playing the communal guitar and what not. We had a barbeque in the evening and then I just hung out at the hostel until 7am (fell asleep in front of the TV at about 3) when I headed to the greyhound bus station to go up to New York. I ended up getting 3 nights of accommodation despite just paying for 1, thanks to the timing of my buses.

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