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We caught the China Bus to Washington - very cheap and full of students! - which put us out in Chinatown so we had to find our way to Dupont Circle where we had booked our hotel. A short metro ride and a walk across the bridge over the Rock Creek Valley looked easy except we missed the street and walked another half km at least with a wheelie bag and backpack each before we asked and had to retrace our steps! We used the Hop On Hop Off Bus for 2 days to get around and get a sense of where everything is - all the buildings are so monumental! We saw Capitol Hill, the White House, the Lincoln Centre, Washington Monument, many of the Smithsonian Museums which are along the National Mall, Union Station, Arlington Cemetery and so much more (all names which are so familiar).
We met up with Dan, who has an apartment on the hill right opposite the Cathedral with the most wonderful view over the Cathedral across to the city. With Dan we organized a day out which took us to Annapolis , the capital of Maryland State on Chesapeake Bay. A lovely city with a timber domed State House, which was the temporary capital of the new US in 1783-84 and where Washington resigned his commission. We visited an historic house, the Hammond-Harwood House, which was very interesting but the guides were abysmal! There were 2 and they argued between themselves before we started,about who would tell us what!!! and then we were subjected to an hour long lecture by a guide who barely drew breath - at one stage she suggested we could ask questions but we couldn't have got a word in!! A salutary lesson about guiding! A very pretty dock area with a memorial to Kunta Kinte, Alex Haley's ancestor whose story is in Roots. From Annapolis we drove to Oxford, a lovely small town with wooden houses along the shoreline, and then across a small ferry (365 years of continuous use) and on to Tilghman Island, where we had dinner, crab cakes, a Maryland specialty, as well as other seafood - delicious!
Our last day in Washington and we set off for the National Gallery of Art - an amazing collection, and then the Portrait Gallery which has modern notables as well as more famous names. That night Dan had arranged for some of his friends to come round for the evening and meet us. An interesting group and we had much in common - a very pleasant conclusion to a busy few days in Washington. A much larger version of Canberra, monumental buildings, office buildings kept to about 10 storeys lower than the height of the Washington Monument, city is fairly sterile and the suburbs attractive with Rose Bay type units, tall trees and many restaurants.
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