Washington D.C. Day One...

On Saturday morning we made our way to the corner of 33rd and 7th, just by Madison Square Garden and got on the Bolt Bus heading to Washington D.C and 4 hours later, we were there!

The Bolt Bus is a bit like the Megabus (which runs here too), but it's just a bit fancier and less cramped. It was super cheap ($35 return each) and on the way there it was really comfy. The four hour journey went really quickly - there wasn't too much to see on the way, just a lot of freeway and similar looking food chains.

The Bolt Bus, purely by coincidence dropped everyone off right by our hotel. We'd got a good deal at the Grand Hyatt hotel on H Street not too far away from the White House.

The hotel lobby was huge - and at the very bottom was a little pool with a grand piano on an island, no-one was playing it though unfortunately.

Our first stop in Washington was what we'd heard was the best burger place in town - Five Guys Burgers. We walked from the hotel through town to Five Guys, town felt bizarrely quiet, we weren't sure if it was because something else was going on, or if because we're so used to the busyness of New York - but Washington is quiet. (Five Guys by the way was OK - it wasn't as good as Shake Shack or Stand Burger, but it was pretty tasty. We're definitely living in the right city for burgers).

After lunch we headed to the White House...

All the roads, buildings and parks around the White House area are all lined up perfectly, so you can stand near the White House and look down the road at the Capitol Building, and you can stand at the Lincoln Memorial and see down past the Washington Memorial and Capitol Building.

By the entrance to the park surrounding the White House was this fancy looking building, it's the buidling of the Treasury (which some tourists standing near us though was the White House... I have to admit I wondered the same for a second), then just round the corner from here, surrounded by a lovely green park was...

I've had to brighten this picture up a bit because the weather wasn't great - but here it is, Mr. Obama's little house. There were quite a few people about taking photos, not as many as we'd imagined, but there were a fair few tourists. Some people were on a special kind of tour, one that I was very jealous of...

The segway tours looked like a lot of fun - much more fun than using your legs! But we were having our own fun on our own little tour...

Opposite the White House (but quite a way away) was a small camp of very loud (and very angry sounding) Christians, whooping and a hollering and scream about something or other, we couldn't make out anything the man was saying as he was shouting into the microphone so loudly it became distorted. I don't think they were angry about Obama as they later said something about wanted God to watch over the Obama family, but he certainly sounded angry about something.

As you walk away from the White House you walk towards the Washington Memorial (the big pointy stone), which stands on a mound surrounded by (I'm guessing 50) American Flags. When you're by the Memorial, if you look behind you you see the White House, if you look to the left you see the Capitol Building and if you look to your right you see the WWII Memorial, the Relfecting Pool and the Lincoln Memorial all lined up. It's all very neatly planned.

The Reflecting Pool is a very long pool that runs between the WWII Memorial and the Lincoln Memorial. It makes each end feel very grand and very peaceful (which I'm sure was the point). On either side of the pool are different Memorials for different wars. It's strange seeing so many Memorials because on one hand it's incredibly moving to see how many people faught for their country, but it's also quite strange to see how many wars America's got itself involved with in such a short space of time. The main thing is though everyone there was being very respectful and it felt very calm.

This is from the other end of the pool, looking back at the Washington Memorial and the Capitol Building in the distance there.

One of the things I'd been looking forward to the most in Washington was seeing the big statue of Mister Lincoln. As we walked towards the memorial building we could start to see his knees coming out of the shadows and gradually saw more and more of him. At one point he looked a little small, but as we got closer we realised he was just as grand as I'd hoped...

He looked ever so powerful and authoritative sitting in his big throne with his drapey gown and jacket and his expression was a bit like the Mona Lisa, not happy, not sad, not frowning, not smiling. I hadn't realised that he was burried there, which made it an even more powerful place...

I'm so glad we got to see it, it was just a grand and just as moving as I'd thought it would be and as he sits in his chair he over looks the Memorials and directly at the Capitol Building on the horizon.

After we'd sat on the steps for a while and visited the gift shop it started to rain, so we jumped in a cab and went back to the hotel. We'd planned on going for a swim but when we got to the swimming pool we realised that the photo on the website was a little misleading - the pool was tiny and full of little children bombing. So we gave it a miss (I really wanted to do some bombing) and went for a drink instead.

Later in the evening we went out for a meal at a place called Thai Tantic! I have to admit we only really went there because we thought the name was fantastic, but the food was delicious too - the decor and atmosphere was a bit strange in the restaurant though, the tables were like diner tables and there were neon lights behind the bar and Tiki decorations on the walls... it was a very strange mix.

After our super spicy Thai food we were pooped so we headed back to the hotel before another day of exploring...