Planes, Jets and Rockets

The Capitol Building
see all photos »

The first thing on our agenda today was to find a pharmacy so Joe could try and find something stronger to try and treat his cold symptoms. He is feeling a little better today, but has a lot of pain in his sinus. Well, today is Sunday and all the local shops are locked up tight. We walk around trying to find something and end up on the road at the back of the Whitehouse. I note that we have stumbled onto the rear end of the green trolley route and just minutes later we boarded the trolley. After transferring to the orange line, it takes us past the National Archives, Union Station and then past the Capitol. We hop off the trolley at the next stop – the most visited museum in the world – the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

Joe in front of the Apollo 11 Command Module
see all photos »

This place is amazing with many full-sized aeroplanes from varying timeframes and uses suspended from the ceiling. From Jets to bi-planes and rockets – this place has everything. There is even a full-size nose of a jumbo jet. We see the original Wright brothers kite plane, to the Apollo 11 Luna Module that went to the moon. We wander in and out of the pavilions and read information on everything from aviation during the world wars, the growth of the American airline industry and Jet aviation. We entered the Albert Einstein Planetarium Dome and sit back in lie-back chairs and watched a short movie on the big bang theory, how the planets were formed, how the sun impacts on the earth. The curved screen really gave the impression of depth in the movie and the size of the screen made you feel immersed in what you were seeing.

Some of those planes are friggin big...

Lunar Landing module
see all photos »

Around 3.30pm we decided on a quick bite to eat in the cafeteria – which was a huge McDonalds store. The menu items they showed you were all value meals and lots of options not available at home like Club and BLT burgers. We just wanted cheeseburgers, and couldn’t believe that even the kids meals came with a double-cheeseburger. We asked for a couple of cheeseburgers – which were available, and a large fries – which ended up being about twice the size of the large fries at home. Everything is bigger over here.  We finished up going through the remainder of the areas we were interested in and decided we better get on the trolley if we were going to make it back to the green loop in time.

Planes
see all photos »

Once on board, we changed our mind and decided to go to Chinatown for dinner. On the walk there, we passed the Spy Museum and couldn’t resist checking out the attached spy shop. Most of the stuff in there was lame, but you could by pen-cameras, sunglasses cameras and other nifty spy stuff. We decided to come back tomorrow and visit the museum, and headed into Chinatown as it started to rain. The place wasn’t full of Chinese restaurants like at home, and very quickly started to feel a bit dodgy. We turned around and ended up going into a place called Ruby Tuesday, where Joe chose a cobb salad and me a chicken pasta with a capers and parmesan cheese sauce.

Jet
see all photos »

We flagged a taxi down after our meal and were happy to see that the rain had stopped. That was another day over in Washington with two more to go.