4th Anniversary and 4th of July

We try to go on a trip every year for our anniversary (at least while we can without kids), and since it's the day before Independence Day, it works out really well to get time off . Plus, we always get fireworks in celebration for our anniversary, right? =)

So this year we decided to go to Washington DC. It's about a 10 hour drive from here, so the 1st day we went about 8 hours and stopped in Hershey, PA! We had to stop at Chocolate World!

About 2 weeks before we went there, they started a Create Your Own Candy Bar! It's like Build-a-Bear, only with chocolate, of course. You pick what's put into it, design the wrapper/cover, and watch as it's made. It was kinda fun....and oh so yummy!









This is the World's Largest Chocolate Bar!!




The next day, we left early and went the 2.5 hours to DC. The hotel let us check in early and upgraded us to a nicer room and gave us free breakfast since it was our anniversary! We love Marriott's!

The Washington Monument.

Unfortunately, we weren't able to get in! It was extremely busy while we were there, since it was 4th of July weekend, and there were lines and waits to everything. You apparently had to get in line at the crack of dawn to get tickets inside the monument.

This is one of the more recent memorials. It's the World War II Memorial. And this is only 1/2 of it! There's a wreath pillar for every U.S. state & territory.

The White House

White House at night.

Can you see the sharp shooters on the roof?? We didn't either, but we're sure they were there. This was taken 4th of July, right after the firework show ended. The security was obviously heightened, we weren't allowed to get any closer than across the street.

Lincoln Memorial.

The Vietnam Wall Memorial (with the Washington Monument in the reflection)

The National Archives.
We weren't allow to take pictures inside this building, so the outside will have to do, but we were able to see the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights, Constitution as well as many other historical and old documents. It was amazing!

We visited the American History Museum. Among many historical American artifacts, they had the original United States flag! It was HUGE!!!! We'd never seen a flag so big! Of course, no pictures allowed of this either, so you'll have to just visit it yourselves.

The Capital Building

Arlington National Cemetery.

JFK and Jackie's grave sites.

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

There was some type of Memorial that was taking place as we were waiting for the Changing of the Guard. We never found out why, but I'm sure it happens a lot these days.



Guarding the Tomb, 24/7

After visiting the Cemetery, we headed South to Mt. Vernon - George Washington's home.

Front of the mansion (especially for back then!) And again, no pics inside.

The Washington's view of the Potomac River from their back porch.

Back porch......chairs lined up across the whole thing. Supposed to be historically accurate

George and Martha Washington were both buried at Mt. Vernon grounds in the exact location that George requested in his writings (probably his will).

Martha Washington

President George Washington

For the 4th of July, we did a lot of walking (actually we probably walked 5-10 miles every day). There is a festival every year that celebrates different countries around the world. (We thought this a little strange, since it is our Independence Day) This year it was Mexico and Asian Pacific Americans. So we walked around that for a while and saw a few of the exhibits, and had some Mexican food. It was sooooo hot that day though, that all we really wanted to do was duck inside an air conditioned building and wait till sundown! Seriously!

We walked about 8 more blocks though, to visit the American Art Museum. We're not usually ones to visit Art Museums, but starting that week and continuing until next January, there was a Norman Rockwell exhibit! All the paintings were from both Steven Spielburg and George Lucus' private collections. It was soooo cool! He was an amazing artist that was able to say so much with just one scene. Hence, the reason the two directors admired him so much. Of course, no pics allowed....again. So you will all have to take a trip yourselves to visit it before they're back in the director's homes and offices or where ever they keep them.

We went back to where the fireworks were going to be set off about 2 hours early to camp out and insure that we had a decent spot. They expected about 2 million people, after all. We could have gotten closer if we wanted to stand in more lines with probably no shade until sundown, but we didn't want any of that. So we sat and chilled under some trees with tons of other people and when the time came closer, moved. We ended up literaly sitting in the street in front of the Washington Monument. It was so amazing and patriotic to have the fireworks going off right there with the monument!

Here's the finale for you all to see!.......Sorry it's sideways!



Our thought to get out of there after the firework show with all the madness was, to walk around & see the White House at night, let it all calm down a bit, ya know? Seemed like a good idea at the time, anyway. We waited about 45 minutes and got into the subway terminal to this.....(Not even on platform yet!)

These are all the people that were waiting on the platform, trying to get into already jammed packed trains! When we finally got onto the platform, we had to wait through 3 or 4 full trains, before we were lucky enough to find a car that could fit us! Every stop from there, 3 or 4 more people tried to get in. We were packed in like sardines!

Needless to say, we learned that we should have just made a mad dash for the subway right away and not waited. Oh well, we made it back to the hotel and drove the 10 hour drive back home the next day. It was a long drive, but we saw a whole lot and packed a lot in! We needed another vacation, though, by the time we were finished. Isn't that always the way!