Day 26 - Washington DC

Washington DC has a program set up called BikeShare. This is various bike stands around the city that you basically rent the bike in 30min blocks and then return it at any of the other bike stand locations so we grabbed some bikes and made our way to the mall. Unfortunately it looks like the White House and the Washington Monument are currently closed so we won't be able to do any tours or go up the monument but I was able to get some photos as we cycled past.

We made our way to the National Air and Space Museum. We started of going on a free guided tour but it was taking a while to actually get anywhere so we decided to go off and explore on our own. One thing that we learnt on the tour is that a lot of the exhibits aren't just models but the real aircraft including the Spirit of St. Louis plane.

One end of the museum is for aviation history and the other for space travel. It was quite a cool museum with a lot to see. From there we walked through the Mall and found somewhere to have lunch. On our way to the Smithsonian Visitors Center (located in a castle no less) we came across National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden which had a big fountain and a few cool sculptures in it. We then made it to the Smithsonian Visitors Center and grabbed some maps.

From there we headed across to the Museum of Natural History. This is the one that the 'Night at the Museum' movie is based. This had a

lot of cool gems; rocks; bones; insects; etc. My favorite area was the dinosaurs where they had the skeletons of a number of different dinosaurs including a Tyrannosaurus Rex.

It was so hot that we decided to go get a coffee on the way to the bike stand we heard lots of sirens and we got stopped at an intersection as a number of police motorbikes and various secret service vehicles went past with a couple of limousines in the middle. We assume it was the presidential motorcade. From our coffee stop we went back to the hotel for a bit of break and then went back out into the heat to go to a Greek restaurant for tea. We then walked to the Spanish Steps to have a look and passed a number of embassies on Embassy Row. As we walking up to The Spanish Steps we saw another motorcade. I guess it is common practice to see motorcades when you are in the nations capital and the most powerful man in the world is cruising around.

Anyway tomorrow is another day so check in then.