Impressions of Washington DC, Day One:

1. This city is positively teeming with people. People of every physical description are everywhere, walking, driving, riding bicycles, riding scooters, hawking wares from the sidewalk, wheeling children about in prams, going, being, doing. It is utterly unlike anyplace I have ever been before in terms of sheer numbers and activity level. So far, my face to face experiences with everyone have been uniformly civil and pleasant, and for that, I am grateful.

2. Traffic and street layouts are insane. The street grids make the highways look mundane and normal by comparison. Getting anywhere from anywhere else requires gyrations that are utterly non-intuitive. Even our GPS system was taken aback, delivering guidance in what I swear was a confused, hesitant manner. There is no readily apparent North or South, Left or Right. Just when you think you know where you are, where you've been, or where you're going, they throw a traffic circle at you wherein as many as six streets converge in a maelstrom of vehicular chaos. I visualize the people who had to figure out the traffic signals and pedestrian walk light sequencing as being wizened, slightly crazed mystics, laboring in a dungeon somewhere, using equal measures of Art, Magick and Science to produce a result that barely keeps from bringing the entire city to its knees. Oh...and when the light turns green – GO! GO NOW! GO RIGHT FUCKING NOW!!!! If you don't, a horn will honk from behind you in .5 seconds or less, or a car will roar around you, and veer wildly into your lane at breakneck speed...while every other car around you is standing still.

3. Everything is under construction. Let me reiterate...*EVERYTHING* is under construction. If you go 500' without seeing a building being restored, an enormous foundation being dug, a multiple lane closure, or ancient masonry being tuckpointed, braced and rejuvenated...you most definitely aren't in Washington DC. Even the zoo had four or five areas in different phases of construction or restoration. There are dozens and dozens of miles of obviously brand spanking new umpty-lebben lane highways and bridges that clearly cost billions upon billions of dollars, and still everywhere you go more are being constructed. Staggering. The scale and breadth of construction in this town is mind boggling. As we drove past the Washington Monument (under construction), I looked to the horizon beyond and was distracted by the biggest crane I have ever seen in my life, looming like an alien thing over the Capital rooftops. If it had spouted a mile long tongue of fire, I would not have been even slightly nonplussed.

4. Sirens. Driving inside the Beltway, there was a police car, fire engine, or ambulance on an emergency call - approximately every five minutes or less - for which we had to move out of the way. This is no small feat in the ubiquitous traffic. Most disquieting (see what I did there?) is the fact that you cannot tell from which direction the siren is coming...the sound reverberates off of all the buildings and surrounds you in a non-directional blanket of cacophony. At one point, a hook and ladder truck screamed up to a park area (in the center of a traffic circle wherein six streets intersected, of course), and pulled into the inside lane as the rig commander said, over the PA, “Is anyone in this park sick? Hold up your hand if you are sick! Someone in this park called for an ambulance. (Pause) Does anyone in this park have a friend who is sick? Hold up your hand.” And then, on cue, an ambulance screamed into the traffic circle from one of the six directions, and we had to stay out of it's way.

5. Finally, something that was intensely personal for me. I have wanted to see this city since I was a child. Tangible pieces of every bit of Americana I have ever been taught, shown, read or heard about since I was a wee laddie, reside here. At the moment of my first real life sighting of the Washington Monument, The Jefferson Memorial, The Tidal Basin, The Capitol Building...everything became somewhat surreal and ethereal for me. It was almost as if my mind, upon seeing the reality of structures that had heretofore only been photos in my experience, retreated to a familiar and comfortable place of its own making. I literally squeed a couple of times. “The Jefferson Monument! The Capitol Dome! The Mall! Squeeeee!” For me, it all comes down to this: the Reality of this nation may have dissolved into greedy corporate proxy wrangling for money. Half of our legislators may be pandering to religious zealots and the other half drooling in their shoes. Our People may be lazy, spoiled, inarticulate, uneducated, disillusioned and stressed...but the symbols of our ethos still shine gloriously. The concepts represented by these great structures and the memorials honoring those who brought forth this nation still endure in my heart and mind and spirit, and I am giddy to be here.

Wednesday and Thursday are best for me. Thursday is a little better than Wednesday, because I just found out I have to plan a department cupcake party Wednesday afternoon, so I can't take a long lunch Wednesday. Just a regular one. (Apparently it's paralegal week, so we'll have cupcakes to celebrate.)

If you find yourself with a little free time and happen to be in the vicinity, two places that most people don't visit and that I highly recommend are the tower of the Old Post Office building (you have to go through airport style security to go up the tower because it would be a perfect spot for a sniper.) The entrance to the tower is down in the food court open area and you take a glass elevator halfway up and there are some stairs too. Very cool views. And with the Washington Monument closed, it's the only game in town.

And the other thing is the National Building Museum. It's a very cool old building with a rich history. The building itself is free, but if you want to see pretty boring exhibits you have to pay an arm and a leg. The whole point of going is to check out the building. Wander all around it on all levels and make sure to check out the men's room by the cafe. One of my favorite places in DC. (Not the men's room, but the whole building.)

I know what you mean. I teared up at the Viet Nam war memorial, even though I didn't personally know anyone who died in the war.

Elspode, what a great post ...

It's wonderful to read about your feelings, and stirring up my own such feelings of awe on visiting D.C.

Thank you.

Yeah. Elspode can write. I really enjoyed the post too. The traffic is crazy here and even though I've gotten used to it, it's wonderful to hear it described by a visitor. It's all true. I'm amazed he drove downtown.

Word.

Glatt, Thursday should work well. We will be back in town all day (our last day here in DC proper), having been a bit less certain about our schedule tomorrow once we've polished off Udvar Hazy first thing in the AM. I encourage you to PM me your phone # so I can text you our lunchtimeish locale on Thursday. We will be coming in from National Harbor on the Green Line, probably to arrive at Archive Station again due to its proximity to the museums we've yet to see. Time allowing, we might do the second half of our day tomorrow using some of your recommendations.

There is so much to see in this town, you'd really need, like, a month to take it all in appropriately. I could *easily* have spent a week just in the Natural History Museum alone.

Washington, Day Two

Today, in order to allow our psyches to recover from the stimulating, yet unnerving, driving experience of yesterday, we rode public transit into DC. It was a good decision. After I ramble on about where we are staying, I'll tell you why.

Our lodgings are on the South side of the District of Columbia, on the Maryland side of the Potomac, in a new megabucks area known as National Harbor. It is an utterly "created" locale, with nothing here being over four years old, according to what I've read. It reminds me very much of two similar developments back in KC - a shopping district called Zona Rosa, and our major downtown refurb known as The Power and Light District. There are a couple of hotels here, a convention center, and a bunch of trendy shops and restaurants, all seemingly brought forth with a scoop of the backhoe and a wave of a wand. We haven't taken a meal here, but I'd be willing to bet my ass that you can't get a bowl of soup anywhere in this district for less than $15.

There is no context for what now stands at this location...whatever was here before on the West bank of the Potomac as it begins to stretch wide into it's estuarine guise was long ago scraped away and buried, leaving several still-empty, perfectly laid out flat lots awaiting a gallery or a chain restaurant, and any number of upscale money pits newly grown and awaiting fresh money. Cirque du Soleil has a sprawling installation of modern tents just up the hill from where we are, having arrived some months ago to enthrall the masses with their neuvo aerial and dance performances, and to draw people from the urban core out to this area that is just now inventing itself. At some point in the not too distant future, the Cirque folk will literally fold their tents, and move on, leaving the developers of this area and those who produce attractions out of nothing to continue their labors, hoping against hope to make National Harbor a destination worthy of the historic town upon whose back it rides.

It was from this beautifully sited but artificial locale that we departed this morning on a bus, bound for the Green Line train, headed to the National Archives. Fittingly, our stop was called "Archive", as you emerge from beneath the city directly opposite the imposing structure that houses our founding documents.

DC has a unified payment solution they call a "Smart Card", and it is a damn fine thing. You order your own card online, paying a flat fee to institute the service, and you soon receive in the mail a physical card that is RFID enabled, with your initial fee minus a setup charge encoded on it. Wave this card over the device on the bus or the train, and you log into the transit system. If a bus, it subtracts a flat fee. If a train, you wave it again as you leave the station of your disembarkation, and you are charged the appropriate fee relative to your departure point. Devices much like ATMs are everywhere so that you can add value to your card as needed. Technologically very impressive, and convenient beyond belief.

The buses we rode were clean and modern, as were the trains. The trains and the system of subway tunnels and stations which they traverse are remarkable, shining examples of both efficient modern electrical and computer technology, as well as icons of tunnel boring systems and uniformity. However, transit is transit. What struck me most was a physical phenomenon that I could have only experienced here in DC.

When we arrived at the Archive Station, our small band assembled at the fare machines near the escalators that led up to the level of the streets from the station. It was a large oval opening with three escalators rising/descending from it, probably some 80' across and twenty feet high. It was raining in the above ground realm, but, as I stood at the base of the escalators, waiting for my companions to sort out their card situations, I felt an airflow steadily rising from above, seeming to blow downward into the subway. I thought at first that it must be windy above, but looking upward, I could see the flags of the Navy Memorial fountain, and saw that they did not move in concert with the airflow I was feeling.

I thought nothing of it...for a couple more minutes. Then, I heard a train screaming into the station from a distance away. The louder and closer it got, the more the airflow from inside the station began to push outward, increasingly flowing around me as I stood still and aware. When the train departed the station a minute later, the opposite was felt...the airflow gushed in from above/outside, and into the station.

As we rode the train into DC earlier, we could feel the pressure on our eardrums increase as we went through tunnels. It was clear that the trains acted as a piston in these confined spaces, increasing the ambient pressure. So, as I stood at the exit to Archive Station, I was finally experiencing the whole of the physical phenomenon...arriving trains pushed the pressurized air ahead of them, and out of the station through the biggest opening available...the main entrance/exit. When the trains left, their speed and girth plowing through the tunnel ahead did the opposite job, creating an area of negative pressure behind them, and drawing a gale inward.

As my companions finished their labors at the fare machines and walked over, ready to ascend the escalators, I felt compelled to make them stop and wait, without explanation, so that they could have the same experience I was having.

They enjoyed the miniature lesson in aerodynamics as much as I had upon learning it was there for the taking.

I promised nerdgasm pics, so here's one, then I gotta go to bed. I know there are Discovery Channel nerds here, and for those who enjoyed "Meteorite Men" as much as I did, the top pic is the oft-referenced "Tucson Ring" meteorite.

For the aircraft nerds amongst us, the bottom pic is from the Air Force Museum at Wright Patterson in Dayton..."Bock's Car", the B-29 that delivered the second atomic bomb over Nagasaki.

This is awesome. Most people are totally oblivious to the wind caused by the trains. You're here one day and notice it and describe it perfectly.

It's most pronounced under and near the rivers, because in other locations, they put in vertical shafts to relieve the pressure. It's more efficient when the trains don't have to push a mile of air in front of them to get where they are going.

For those of us over here who think of America as one place, it is really interesting to read these descriptions written by an American tourist in America! :)


Sent by thought transference

It's also fun, as a lifelong DC resident, to read descriptions of the city from another perspective.

Wish I could meet up, but I'm out of town for a couple weeks.

I didn't notice this thread until just now. I don't really know you but you might pass me on the closed-off street if you visit the White House. I'm in the building with Albert Gallatin out in the fenced courtyard.

By the way, if you need lunch/dinner and have a good food budget, Old Ebbitt Grill on that corner... a bit pricy but gooood.

Just came back from lunch with Elspode at the Smithsonian.

He's as laid back and cool in person as he is in the Cellar. I'm afraid I didn't take any pictures, but Tree Fae got one or two and hopefully they should be up tonight or tomorrow.

Nice to meet you, Splode!

@Spode I almost feel as if you were describing London at some points. I'm sure the construction work would have been true this year (Olympics) too.

The transport card device is the same here too, and in many European cities. I budgeted to buy one in Amsterdam, but on my first morning I realised how much closer together things were than I had expected... so I spent the money elsewhere ;)

Gorgeous writing, a feast for the brain, thank you very much. I had almost forgotten why I missed you so much.
Can't wait to see photos.
And yes, it's an ambition of mine to see the War Memorial (featured in so many American novels I have read) and the Jefferson Memorial - I'm a big fan of your third President.

I'd also love to show you (and many other Merkin Dwellars) around London.
Lucky Glatt that he got to meet you on his manor.