Tourist Spots In Washington DC

by Deb
(MD)

There are many great tourist spots in Washington DC. One of my favorite places to visit is Washington, DC. I'm very lucky, as my daughter works and lives there, so I usually have a cheap place to stay! In that city, the hotels are pretty pricey so it's nice to be able to save on accommodations.

As a lover of old architecture, I'm in my glory when in DC. The buildings there are so impressive, and so beautiful.

The capitol dome at night--from every angle it is just gorgeous! The intense white against the dark blue night sky--it's embedded in my memory to think about when I consider the word "beautiful".

Inside the US Capitol is breathtaking, also. The last tour we took through the capital was led by a staff member of our Congressman, and my daughter was a former congressional intern, so we kind of got the "deluxe" tour.

We even got to take the "train" in the basement of the capitol over to the Cannon Building where we started from. That is a special privilege to do that!


Also the last time I was in DC (at Mother's Day this year) my daughter and I went to the Post Office Tower--something I'd heard about but never visited.

My daughter had never gone there because she thought there was a charge for it--but it was free! You ride in an elevator 300+ feet to the top of this tower, and from there you have the best view of the entire area!

MUCH better than when in the Washington Monument, I have to see. Huge windows some covered with Plexiglas, but others with wires preventing any accidents.

I could see all the way to Alexandria, Virginia from there! I highly recommend a visit there.


I also enjoyed the renovations made to the Smithsonian American History Museum.

I've been following them on Flickr for awhile so it was fun to be able to see it all in person. I loved the 19th century laundry exhibit there, for instance!

I found it fascinating to see each step in the process that a woman would have had to take to do her laundry back then. They had a few hands on things with the exhibit-you could lift a water bucket that weighed 21 pounds, and read that it took 25 of them to do a load of wash.

You could also twist this bar to get a feel of what it was like to wring the clothes out. Very enlightening! Weird, but I really loved that exhibit of all of them there!

Another favorite of my tourist spots in Washington DC is the Eastern Market. They are still outside after the fire a few years ago, but the renovations are almost complete for them to move back in.

There is an artist there who whose work I love but I hate to spend the $$ to buy anything, but I expect I will give in to my whims eventually. The fruits and vegetables are tempting, too!

And there was a pickle booth with all different levels of garlic, and gave out samples--they were delicious, and I'm not even that big of a pickle fan!

Eastern Market is not one of the usual tourist spots in Washington DC but it is a really cool, home-y neighborhood district where you can feel like you are one of the locals very easily.

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