Washington D.C. The captial of the United States of America!

Oh man, is this country proud to be American, there are flags flying EVERYWHERE! I think being in the capital just before the elections added to the patriotism. The elections are unbelievable. All the ad's on TV jusst slate the opponent. Quite amusing.

Haloween is also huge, they go all out and there are decorations everywhere. It's bigger than Christmas back home!

So we arrived by bus and were picked up by Tara's cousin Randie. He took us back to his home about an hour outside Washington. There we met his family. His wife, Pam, 1 of 2 sons, Brandon and their adorable daughter Maddie. oh and 3dogs! Eek!

We went to an outlet Mall and spent the day shopping!! Clothes are so cheap here, so we went a bit O.T.T. I had to buy another suitcase! ha ha! Later, We found out how unfit we were on Wii Fit!

We woke bright and early and went into the City to look around. We took a waslk through the Arlington War Cemetory. There were white crosses to mark the graves everywhere. It was a sobering thought as this country is still at war. We then walked over the bridge and towards the Lincoln Memorial, Pool of Reflextion and Washington Momunment. They treat there presidents like Kings, so whenever there is a really good one they'd put up some sort of memorial. We reenacted forest gump, and any other film we could think of that was shot around here.

After walking to the Washington momument we got tickets to go to the top. Inside the ticket office, we saw an Armish Family. I wasn't gonna miss this photo oppotunity and sat outside waiting for them to come out, and when they did i pretended to take pictures of the momument behind, but little did they know i was taking pictures of them. Such a tourist... i know. but they were fasinating!

We went to the top of the Washington monument which was built to commemorate the first president, George Washington. The monument is both the world's tallest stone structure and the world's tallest obelisk, standing 555 feet 5.5 inches. (Yeah I Wikipedia'd it) the views from the top were really cool. We could see just about everything. Also there were other photo's from the past and you could see how the landscape changed and new buildings had been built.

We then went to the Holocaust Museum. It was very interesting but quite disturbing. They mentioned the Witnesses a few times, but the one that stuck out to me was that dispite the thousands of J.W's that were taken into consentation camps for not fighting. Not 1 of them stood down from their beliefs. Some of the things they did to those poor Jew's were just sick.. demonic even. Was certainly an eye opener.

We ate at he Hard Rock Cafe, and then went to see George at the white house. He needed some help packing. There was this Crazy Man that stood outside the white house all day long. Tara asked what he was looking at and he just ignored her, she asked if he couldn't talk and he looked at her and shook is head. Weird. We asked some cops and they said he walks around the white house and then stands and stares all day long. "We get a lot of Wacko's round here" they told us.

That night we took Maddie to see High School Musical 3. But really she was our excuse. We loved it! We started waving along and she said, "where's your foam finger?!" another oppotunity missed. Note to self, must take it with us everywhere!

We flew out from Baltimore...GOODMORNING BALTIMORE! (or whatever alternative Tara likes to sing!) Stopped at an outdoors store so Tara could pee, and played dress up in all the hunting gear and camoflauge! Caught flight fine, although baggage overweight. (all the shopping, eekk)

We had a nice relaxing time here and like everywhere wish we could have stayed longer to see and do more. The Hukka's were very hospitable and looked after us!

Now we head out West on a 2hours trip to Atlanta (or Alaska as Tara was telling people) then a 6hour flight to Seattle!

Tune in next time for more stories on Jem and Tars Adventure!

(Play out with Theme Music)

xxx