Today, we spent the afternoon with friends in D.C. and here are a few things I noticed at some places we visited for the first time as well as some places we'd already been:
At the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, the actual SpaceShipOne, "the first privately developed and piloted vehicle to reach space."
At the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (the rotunda pictured above) we saw the Hope Diamond, which, seriously, just wasn't as impressive as I thought it would be. But obviously everyone else thought it was because I couldn't get close enough to take a decent picture. I actually find a giant ancestor of the sloth (below) much, much more impressive--look at those hands! For some reason, I find this creature much more scary than the T-Rex. Shudder.
In the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden, we walked past Roxy Paine's Graft, a stainless steel metal sculpture of a tree. I could have looked at this thing for hours. It was mesmerizing, like a terminator tree from Mordor.
And I would be remiss not to mention one of the culinary sights of the day--and I say "sights" because I did not actually eat this. Below is a grasshopper taco served at a wonderful tappa-style restaurant, Oyamel Cocino Mexicana on 7th Street. The food was amazing, the service fantastic and I was glad to have a friend adventurous enough to order--and eat--such a culinary, um, delicacy.
At the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, the actual SpaceShipOne, "the first privately developed and piloted vehicle to reach space."
At the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (the rotunda pictured above) we saw the Hope Diamond, which, seriously, just wasn't as impressive as I thought it would be. But obviously everyone else thought it was because I couldn't get close enough to take a decent picture. I actually find a giant ancestor of the sloth (below) much, much more impressive--look at those hands! For some reason, I find this creature much more scary than the T-Rex. Shudder. In the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden, we walked past Roxy Paine's Graft, a stainless steel metal sculpture of a tree. I could have looked at this thing for hours. It was mesmerizing, like a terminator tree from Mordor.
And I would be remiss not to mention one of the culinary sights of the day--and I say "sights" because I did not actually eat this. Below is a grasshopper taco served at a wonderful tappa-style restaurant, Oyamel Cocino Mexicana on 7th Street. The food was amazing, the service fantastic and I was glad to have a friend adventurous enough to order--and eat--such a culinary, um, delicacy.
(Images: mine)