One sprint to Dunkin' Donuts and a minimum purchase to enable wi-fi access later, Thomas retrieved the Megabus booking reference to enable our passage to Washington.

We arrived at the hostel from the film Hostel (however make sure to replace the attractive blond girls with mental, angry, prematurely-menopausal witches and a middle aged man in short shorts) - wasn't that an awkward few days! Trudy's paranoia and natural distrust of humans was certainly put to good use...

What started out as regular sightseeing soon descended into Tom's mindless collecting and photographing of museums, monuments and memorials to the point that Trudy decided to protest by jumping into Tom's camera shots while shouting "You're now a pleb". But of course the shots had to be centred/ rightangled/ parallel/ geometrically perfect/ involving calculations of pythagoras, giving Trudy maximum time to deomstrate (and shout) her feelings.

While in Washington we learnt that although traffic lights might allow pedestrians to cross, this does not necessarily prevent trucks from turning right and almost ploughing into said pedestrians. Nor does being British prevent said pedestrians from shouthing very loudly (but still politely) at the driver of said truck. Cue some hasty apologies. However we should have known that this day was to bring us close to the edge, as on the way to the Museum of American History a bat fell out of the sky not 6 feet from us, where it proceeded to die while a grown man poked it with a stick (does this actually ever help?).

Trudy would like to make it known to anyone who might make the same mistake (her dad!) that the statue of Abraham Lincoln at his memorial does not come to life and give you advice, despite what The Simpsons and Night at the Museum 2 will have you believe. Arlington Cemetary was lovely, however the shine was taken off it somewhat by being trapped after closing time. It really is difficult to appear dignified and respectful while jumping over a fence on hallowed ground in a national memorial.

On our last night we returned to the Hostel hostel only to be greeted by the Grand High Witch shrieking at us that we should have left yesterday. Trudy laid the smackdown on her and demanded back the sheets that had been rudely stolen from our beds while Tom rushed off to the loo ("well I can't deal with this now because I'm going to p*ss myself"). Following this pleasant exchange it was clearly time for us to return to familiar territory (Norfolk, but this time in Virginia). So with our 6:30am Megabus booking reference tattoed onto our foreheads and replacement bedsheets in hand we headed for another restful night's sleep watching the doorway for organ harvestors.