Washington, DC: Day 1 (Capitol Building and Monuments)

From Norfolk we headed north to Washington, DC! Not only did we get to see all the awesome stuff DC has to offer but we also got to stay with cousins for 2 weeks and my kids were in heaven (even with strep throat). Over the course of those two weeks we took the train into DC 4 different days. Turns out kids 10 and under are free on the passenger train, which was fantastic. And even though random passengers liked to tell us that whatever car we had chosen to sit in was the “Quiet Car” (ie no noise/kids allowed), they were usually lying, and we enjoyed ourselves anyway.

First train ride!

The US Capitol Building

Every state has been invited to contribute two statues of notable people. This one is Amelia Earhart from Kansas. 

On the Capitol tour (also free but requires reservations). The murals in this room - all the way to the tippity top of the dome - tell stories of America’s history. 

Eating lunch from the food trucks on our loooooong walk from the Capitol to the Washington Monument. The gyros we got were delicious; the hot dogs and fries not so much. We were all so thirsty too because we weren’t allowed to carry water into the Capitol so we had dumped our water bottles, and then all of the drinking fountains were still turned off for winter.

Sculpture garden!

The Washington Monument finally in sight! Dave is carrying what we call the Coatpocalypse. It was super freezing cold when we left the house and then got way hot soon after we left the Capitol. We didn’t make that mistake again!

Narwhal!

This is how far we are from the Capitol Building.

We got tickets ahead of time (they’re free) so we could take the elevator up to the top of the Washington Monument. It was really cool up there!

This girl found a 4 leaf clover right here.

We continued our walk towards the Lincoln Memorial, stopping at this WWII Memorial - one of the few with water still in the fountains.

This is the huge reflecting pool on the Mall. Most of the pools and fountains were off - I think because winter wasn’t quite over yet.

The Lincoln Memorial is my favorite.

We read both of Lincoln’s speeches that are engraved on the walls (The Gettysburg Address and his second Inaugural Address). They are excellent.

We continued our walking tour, passing through the Vietnam War Memorial (very sobering) and the Korean War Memorial (above).

After upwards of 20,000 (adult) steps we finally reached the Martin Luther King Jr Memorial which is right on the banks of the Tidal Basin and surrounded by blossoming cherry trees. It was so pretty.

It was a long but fun and educational day. We caught the free trolley back to the train station. Some of us had had enough walking!

Yorktown Battlefield, Jamestowne, and Colonial Williamsburg (and Pyramids)

Our last full day in Norfolk we visited the Colonial National Historical Park. We started with the Yorktown Battlefield which is the site of the last major battle of the Revolutionary War. This park is super extensive, encompassing camps and redoubts (small forts) of the British, French, and Americans.

Townes manning the cannons!

One of the last two British holdouts/redoubts.

The other of the last two British holdouts/redoubts.

The French captured one and the Americans the other within 30 minutes of each other, 

forcing Cornwallis to surrender. 

The Moore House where the terms of surrender were signed.

A ship toilet! This is part of the exhibit at the visitors center in Yorktown.

After Yorktown we drove a little ways to Historic Jamestowne, the first permanent English settlement in America. 104 men and boys arrived in 1607 at this site.

The walls you see are believed to be where the original church was - the one where Pocahontas 

and John Rolfe were married. 

The James River is enormous.

In front of a statue of John Smith, who helped colonize Jamestown.

In front of the church that was built just next to the original one and is currently being restored.

There is a cool cemetery behind the church.

Standing in front of the site of the first landing.

They still blow glass the old fashioned way at the Glasshouse. (A four-year apprenticeship is required before you can work here blowing glass!)

We decided to grab dinner (and some candy) in Colonial Williamsburg. It is a beautiful town and looks more like a movie set than a real place. We didn’t get to see a lot of it but did walk across the street to take photos at William and Mary College because it was just so pretty.

Turns out this is known as the Wren Building!

Wright Brothers Memorial and the Atlantic Ocean!!

The kids and I drove 1.5 hours south to see the Wright Brothers Memorial at Kitty Hawk, NC. It was fantastic. Ever since Dave and I listened to David McCullough’s book about the brothers in 2011 (I totally remember the date because we were doing P90X while listening, haha) I have been interested in visiting this site. Orville and Wilbur were super intelligent, loved to learn and solve problems, and were incredibly determined. I love that their parents valued teaching them how to learn over teaching them what to learn. After their first successful flight in 1903 it was only 66 years later that Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon! We happened to arrive at the memorial just in time for a half-hour ranger talk, which was perfect.

A reproduction of the flyer that finally proved flight was possible. 

(The real one is in DC at the Air & Space Museum.)

This stone is where the first flight landed, after just 12 seconds in the air. On this particular day the brothers made 4 successful flights, each one longer than the one before. The 4 markers in the photo above identify how far apart each landing was. (They had planned to do a 5th flight that day but while they were warming up indoors, the flyer caught a gust of air and was crumpled.)

This memorial was placed in 1928, on the 25th anniversary of the first successful flight. I’ve seen a photo of Amelia Earhart standing in front of this marker the day it was dedicated, which I think is just so cool.

This memorial says around the base, in part, “…conceived by genius, achieved by dauntless resolution and unconquerable faith.”

After visiting the memorial we had to touch the Atlantic Ocean (the big girls don’t remember doing it and the 3 little ones never have!) so we grabbed a quick lunch, ate in the van, and then headed out to the beach.

The beach sorta looked dingy after the glorious Destin beaches, I’ll be honest (is my ability to appreciate beaches ruined forever?), but it was still pretty awesome.

The shells here are so much bigger, colorful, and more varied than the ones in Destin.

This beautiful babe fell and bonked her forehead on the concrete running down the Wright Brother’s Memorial. It looked pretty awful but luckily didn’t seem to be too serious.

We topped off our trip to the Outer Banks with milkshakes. 

It was a pretty fantastic day, if I do say so myself.