DC for the Day .... Avenues & Houses

Of all the fabulous things that I did on my NY trip at the end of 2015, my day trip (yes day trip!) to Washington was one of my favourites. It was also one of the most planned days I had as I wanted to maximise the most of my time in the city. Catching the early train helped as I arrived into the DC at 9.30. I stopped at Shake Shack in the station for a Shack breakfast (blog post to follow) and a refuel of sumpton coffee!

I had a long list of things I wanted to do including;

·    Pennsylvania Avenue & The White House, Smithsonian & Constitution avenue, Arlington memorial and Georgetown. – My Scandal moments would include some of these: The White House, Lincoln Memorial, Potomac River, travel on the Subway and drink red wine.!

There are a number of avenues leading off from Union station and I headed down the one that would take me towards the FBI building. One of the big things that I noticed about Washington from my previous visit was the heightened security measures in and around all of the city. One of the parks that I walked past was a memorial garden for police officers that have lost their lives on duty or active service.... lots to gun crime and some only months into their service. 
On my previous visit I went inside the FBI building on a guided tour which was fascinating, now you can't get near the building for concrete planters and bollards. It was still great to walk around and see some of the legal buildings around this area. The old post office tower was also a great way to see the city from a height, this has now closed and is being converted to a Trump hotel! (he is definitely moving into the district one way or another!)

Continuing down Pennsylvania avenue I came across the most famous house on this street…. The White House ( again somewhere that you can no longer visit) but still can view from afar. It’s a gorgeous Georgian building and I am completely fascinated by it, those walls of that building house so many secrets!. The last time I was there Marine One landed on the lawn and President Clinton ran out from the White House and boarded it to fly somewhere. No Marine One landing on the lawn this time, but there were lots of FBI agents around as the national tree lighting event was taking place later that evening.

As I stood facing the White House and thought of the presidents past and present, fact and fiction; Kennedy, Clinton, Obama, Bartlett & Grant (West Wing & Scandal!) I wondered who would be the next President to grace the Oval office... would it  be another Clinton or a Trump?!! with campaigning now in full presidential glory I am following avidly until the big night in November.

My next stop was back across the avenue into the Smithsonian Museum of American History – I could have easily lost half a day here and had planned to if the weather had been wet/cold. My one stop within here was to see Julia Childs kitchen – Julia Childs is one of America's most famous chefs and bought cooking to life on the screens of US networks. Her love of cooking started when she met her husband Paul and thought she should learn to cook whilst stationed in Paris. She enrolled in the Cordon Bleau school  and went on to publish her own Mastering the Art of French Cookery. On returning to the US, her husband built her kitchen to accommodate her 6ft 2" frame and it is this that now resides in the Smithsonian from her home in Massachusetts. The kitchen was delightful and I had complete book envy within the bookshelves.

Leaving the Smithsonian I headed across the gardens to the Washington memorial to start the iconic walk down towards the Lincoln memorial. Its hard to walk this space without thinking of all the famous movie moments that have been filmed here…… pop back tomorrow when I relive my Forest Gump moment and honour some heroes.