Meandering...: Day 17 - D.C. Smithsonian Museums

It's late and we are all so tired. We walked a lot again today. If you're following along, grab your map. Again today we rode the Metro into the city, getting off across from the Archives on 7th St. where we got on the Old Town Trolley again. It took us past Union Station and around the Capitol complex before we got off at Independence Ave and 12th St SW. We walked to the Bureau of Engraving & Printing ticket booth on 15th St just to find out that most tours were booked so we got tickets for the 6:30 tour.

Then we walked all the way back to the Jefferson Dr entrance to the Smithsonian Castle where we took a break for drinks.

After a rest we left The Castle on the Independence Ave side. Here Rich is showing our grands how to read a sundial.

From the street, I took this photo of the Parterre, or ornamental garden, with the Castle at the back of the garden...beautiful and quietly peaceful.

A tour guide had said that the best cafe in town was inside the Smithsonian's American Indian Museum so we walked east along Independence Ave. The food was fabulous and the interior space was just what we needed.

It was so hot and humid today that it was nearly unbearable so this large, circular, stunningly beautiful space was perfect for the kids to run off some steam after our typical late lunch.

We had heard that the Smithsonian's Air & Space Museum is the most popular of all, so we walked back to it along Independence Ave.

This building is enormous and contains informative displays as well as original planes, jets, rockets, space modules, etc etc.

Now we were running out of time so we walked up 7th St to Madison then west to the Smithsonian's Museum of American History. Along the way we stopped for...

another shot of the Capitol from the National Mall.

A peek inside the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden

These two magnificent pieces of petrified wood from Holbrook, AZ in front of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.

I neglected to get this picture of the kids yesterday when we checked out the Star Spangled Banner at the Smithsonian's Museum of American History.

But the main reason we were back at this museum today was for Shelby to see the actual Ruby Slippers that Dorothy wore in the original Wizard of Oz. She was so thrilled!

In addition to other exhibits that the kids were amazed by, this huge doll house was interesting to Shelby and Dylan. They were trying to find all 25 of the pets inside this huge doll house.

We would have loved to be able to spend more time in all the museums we visited today, and there are many more we didn't even get to step inside. But, we had an appointment at 6:30 so had to walk from there back down to the Bureau of Engraving & Printing...and then it rained!

We finally found shelter at the Holocaust Memorial Museum, by then it was pouring and we were all soaked to the skin.

We were drenched when we made it to the Bureau of Engraving & Printing for our tour. It was worth it though because all three of the kids were absolutely enthralled watching money being manufactured.

After our tour we walked back up 15th St to Independence Ave where we flagged a cab for a ride back to the Metro station on 7th & D Sts. Even though we were all wearing wet clothes, our grands just had to get one last splash of the world's oceans before riding the escalator down to the train.