holidays

We dropped the rental car off, got a shuttle to the airport and then a $3.10 bus downtown. The bus drove past the Pentagon, and Arlington cemetery. We walked to the Mall and had a look in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, which was good but busy. We walked up the Mall through the butterfly and sculpture gardens to the Smithsonian Art Museum, where they had many good pictures: David’s Napoleon, lots of Whistler and Winslow Homer, some Turner, Constable, Ingres and Impressionists. There was an exhibition of Allen Ginsberg’s ‘beat’ photographs, taken for the ’50’s to the ’90’s, including photos of William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac.

We had a very good lunch in the French cafe on the ground floor of the Art Museum, and then walked up the Mall to the Capitol. It started raining, and there was a thunderstorm. We walked from the Capitol down Pennsylvania Avenue, past the Department of Justice to the White House. There were a few tourists outside the White House, and there was some sort of event going on near the Treasury where a crowd had gathered, but apart from that it was fairly quiet.
We got the bus back, and had dinner in the hotel.