Washington, DC

We took off for Washington, DC yesterday for a really long day trip.  We left at 7 AM and didn't return until almost 11 PM.  The plan was to drive to Springfield, VA to catch the metro to the National Zoo.  After hanging out at the zoo for a couple of hours, we were going to take the metro downtown to hit the monuments, White House, and then do dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe.  After dinner we would head for home.

What I wasn't expecting was the crowds!  The metro was bulging with people packed in like sardines, the zoo was so full it was tough to even get up to the exhibits to see the animals.  There was no possible way of getting pictures in downtown DC without loads of people in them.  The wait at the Hard Rock Cafe was 90 minutes - much longer than our stomachs were telling us they could handle.  I guess the combination of the beautiful day, it being the last day of spring break, and the National Cherry Blossom Festival brought the crowds.

But, all in all, it was still a great day.  The animals we saw were cool.  My personal favorites were actually the Prairie Dogs.  I know, not all that exotic, but they were really neat animals.  Plus they seemed to love posing for the camera.  They were probably just trying to figure out why the psycho with the camera was making weird kissing noises at them like they were cats.  Here's one of my favorites:

There was no way I was getting any stock shots in downtown DC but we did still brave our way through the crowds to see the Capitol, the Washington Monument, the WW II Memorial, and the Lincoln Memorial.  Here's a shot of the gang at the Washington Monument:

On our way to the Hard Rock, we swung by the White House.  We were almost up to the fence when a couple of Park Police started yelling at the crowd to get back.  They cleared the whole area in front of the fence all the way back almost 100 yards.  We stuck around a while to see what was happening.  One of the police officers said they didn't have a clue.  Apparently they received a call from the Secret Service telling them to clear the area but they didn't pass on the "why."  Actually, he made it pretty clear that there is a bit of animosity between the two groups and they don't really communicate well with each other.  There were also some guys up on the roof with telescopes.  It was all a bit odd.

After finding out the wait was 90 minutes at the Hard Rock, we took the metro back to my truck and headed for home.  We still needed food so we stopped at the good ol' Silver Diner.  It was AWESOME.  They actually had a lot of veggie food and the milk shakes were unbelievably good.  It almost made up for the lack of Hard Rock.  So despite all the modifications to my original plan, I think we all agreed it was still a good day!