Got up really late today. It was very hard to get moving. We stayed at the Colony South Hotel. The outside and lobby is beautiful, but the rooms are dated. Breakfast was excellent. There was pancakes, eggs, grits, sausage, cereal, and yogurt. We met Sasa today. She is pretty cool. Seems nice enough and has lots of experience. We left a little late...around 9 am and went to Arlington National Cemetery. We immediately went to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and watched the changing of the guard. Sasa didn't do a very good job of covering the symbols of the headstones and we only saw Arlington House, JFK, and the Unknown Soldier. We only walked 3 miles in Arlington, so that shows you how much we missed. We had a photo stop at Iwo Jima memorial and then ate lunch in the Pentagon city mall. I can't get over how the kids spend so much money on Starbucks. Before we reboarded the bus almost all of the kids spent $6 on Frappuccinos. We left Pentagon City and headed to Mount Vernon. This is always one of my favorite parts of the trip. We had tons of time here this trip as well. We didn't watch the orientation film, instead we watched the 4D film with the snow, bombs and fog. I took the kids over to the community buildings first and the gardens first. LaFayette's ship was in the Potomac during this trip and they were getting ready for a big celebration because of this. We walked through the gardens, which were absolutely beautiful at this time of year. The vegetable gardens had lots of different varieties growing, fruits and vegetables were planted and on trees. They had piglets in their pig pen and the kids liked the sheep and cattle. There were reenactors everywhere this time. I don't remember there being this many as the last few times. The threshing round barn was set up this year with wheat and reenactors to tell about it, which iwas nice. There were several "slaves" in the slave cabin and a nice touch to some of the kids research projects. We went through the house....same as usual, but always beautiful. Then we went to the tombs and down to the farm. It was incredibly hot this year and very very humid. I was drenched in sweat by the time we finished up. I found two neat books in the gift shop this year, an activity book that I will probably use next year as some kind of activity. The other was the will and last testiment of George Washington, which is an excellent primary source for kids that are researching slavery....and very interesting to boot.

Dinner was at Nando's in Alexandria with chicken, mashed potatoes, corn, salad, and of course, brownies. As always, it was exceptional. Nando's is always a nice change from burgers, pizza, and sandwiches.

After dinner was our ghost tour in Alexandria. I've done this tour before and I remember it being really good. This year it seemed like more history than ghost stories. The one in Williamsburg seems better. After the ghost tour, we headed back to our hotel and had a mass rush to the laundry. Note to self, make sure you do laundry twice so that you don't have to worry about getting caught up in the laundry mess halfway through the trip.

Staying at Colony South Hotel. The beds are nice and comfy, but the rooms themselves seem rather outdated. Breakfast was good, but wish there were more cold options. They had eggs, sausage, grits, pancakes or french toast, every day and then cereal and toast.