Washington DC

Sonny's passport expired this year, and while Singapore allows him to quickly and cheaply apply for a new one online, he must pick it up in person at a Singapore embassy. Unfortunately, in the US there is only one and its in DC. We had discussed having him fly on a red-eye, pick it up and head back the same day, but since neither of us has ever been to DC we decided to make it a short trip. (Technically I did go to DC when I was 2 or 3 years old, but I don't remember any of it.)

We booked Southwest's cheapest flights, which meant flying into the Baltimore airport on a late night flight. I managed to find a good deal on a hotel that was near the airport to soften the hardship. We flew on Tuesday evening after work, and came back to Chicago on Thursday evening. It was a pretty whirlwind trip so we planned to constrain our sightseeing to the Mall.

At Midway on Tuesday night, I realized that I had not taken a domestic airline flight in a very long time! We made it to Baltimore at 2 am and took a short taxi to our hotel where we immediately passed out. The next morning we awoke early(ish) and excited. I spent some time trying to work out the train schedule with my very tired brain until I gave up and asked Grace for help. After kind of getting it sorted, we climbed aboard the hotel's free shuttle and set off for the train station. Turns out it was very cheap and easy to get the tickets and we were soon on board heading towards Union Station.

Once we got to Union we decided to grab some food as we both had skipped coffee and food that morning. I grabbed some coffee and a bagel while Sonny was snared by the delicious aroma of Bojangles fried chicken. After food, we decided our first mission would be to get Sonny's new passport. The Singapore embassy closes for 2 hours in the middle of the day for lunch, so we wanted to make sure we got there before that. 

We headed to the DC metro, got tickets, and worked out which stop we needed. A short walk later after arriving, we found the embassy. It was very quick once we got through security, and we were soon headed back toward the Mall with Sonny's passport.

The Mall was way cooler than I had anticipated! We decided to just walk the whole length of it, and check out all the memorials. Sonny was most excited to see the Lincoln Memorial as he had apparently seen it in so many movies that it really represented America to him. We made sure to take several pictures and selfies for Sonny's green card application, figuring some patriotic photos couldn't hurt. :)

The sun was beginning to set and we were starting to get tired so we decided to see the Vietnam memorial then head back to the metro to start the journey back to our hotel as we were both pretty tired. I was unprepared for how affecting the Vietnam memorial would be. All day long there had been school children running around and being generally boisterous. However, when we started walking down the path to the wall, everyone became silent. It was a very eerie and surreal feeling, so many people being absolutely silent, the undulating cold stone, and so many names. I don't think I will ever forget it. We decided to grab dinner, but in our sleep-deprived state were having trouble picking a restaurant. We ended up at the Union Station Shake Shack, which, while delicious was not exactly novel. Over our burgers we decided to come back to DC the next day to explore the Smithsonians. We then caught a train and headed back to the hotel to pass out.

The next morning we repeated the journey, although much more smoothly as we were becoming pros at this point. Walking down a different street on our way to the Mall meant were serendipitously found a building for Grace. We also checked out the beautiful malinois at the guard house. 

Our first stop? The Museum of Natural History. We both found plenty to geek out over, including the Hope diamond, a giant squid, a tank of coral for Sonny, and loads of animals for me. It was interesting to see it also through the eyes of a museum worker, and notice operational things as well - they also use timed-entry tickets!

It was hard to tear ourselves away, but we had more museums to see! I feel as though I could easily spend a week just touring all the Smithsonian museums. We decided to go peek inside the "castle" next, then check out the Pioneer Zephyr's engine in the Arts and Industries building. Unfortunately, it was closed for renovations so I never got to see it.

Finally, we decided to spend the rest of the day at the Air and Space museum! It was a fantastic place, full of cool stuff and we managed to see it all, even though we had to hurry a bit.

We stopped by to see the White House, then grabbed dinner, along with lots of people in suits. Mindful of our flight time, we boarded the train to head back to BWI airport and home. It was a whirlwind trip and loads of fun.