One of the most common questions we get is also the hardest to answer: What is the best place you’ve visited? There are so many great places, not to mention experiences, that it is hard to pick just one – or even several – that rank supreme. So instead of crowning a single destination, we’ve chosen to highlight eight favorites selected from the 58 stops we made over 52 weeks of continuous travel. Read More…
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DC Comics
The Washington D.C. metro is probably the best of its kind in the U.S., which, now that I think about it, isn’t saying all that much because public transportation systems here kind of blow. But even compared with Europe, DC’s metro is pretty good. Everything is clearly marked and the spaghetti tangle of subway lines (similar to those in Paris) actually facilitates getting most places in the city.
Figuring out how to pay for it is another matter entirely. Every departure and destination combination has its own price, and each of those prices change depending on whether you’re traveling at a “regular” hour, a “discounted” hour or a “peak of the peak” hour. If you have a “Smart Trip” card, you pay 25 cents less than the normal price. If you don’t have a card, your leg gets humped by Hoyas, or something. A tourist could skip all of that nonsense and just get a day pass, except for the small fact that day passes aren’t actually valid for an entire day. Ha-ha, stupid tourists.
We’re not complete morons and we’ve (mostly) mastered basic arithmetic. So with a little planning and finger counting we calculated how much to put on our Smart Trip cards. One unplanned trip at a “peak of peak” time, though, had us fifteen cents short on our final stop. No worries. We’ll just add the fifteen cents at a vending machine and we’ll be square. Only this particular machine wouldn’t accept credit cards or change, dollars only! Stupid tourists.
Two For None
The National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum are housed in different wings of the same building and are separated by this nifty little courtyard. I generally find portraits to be among the least interesting form of art. In fact, the most entertainment I’ve gotten from a portrait probably came from watching the looks of disappointment by people seeing the Mona Lisa for the first time. But the American Art gallery is hosting a special exhibit of Norman Rockwell paintings until January 2, 2011. The collection, on loan from directors George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, rivals the one assembled by the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA. The free admission charge includes access to both museums as well as the special exhibit. It’s well worth the price.
Washington DC
Washington D.C. may be our favorite U.S. city. It’s large enough to have everything you want within easy reach but small enough that you don’t have to fight for space on crowded streets. They’ve even opened one of our favorite New York restaurants, Carmines, and will soon open a Crumbs cupcake shop. But most of all, Washington is simply beautiful. Probably due to its origins as a planned city with European roots, Washington just seems like it was put together by people who valued aesthetics. It is no surprise that six of the top ten buildings in a recent “America’s Favorite Architecture” survey reside in D.C. Naturally the great government buildings, like the Capitol, and the fabulous monuments are highlights, but many of the city’s lesser buildings are absolutely gorgeous too. Walking down miscellaneous streets while surrounded by the dizzying mix of grand architectural styles is a joy.
And as a tourist, I’ve never seen so many free things to do in any other city. In what must be a socialist plot to undermine our capitalist democracy, the Smithsonian’s 12 museums, the national zoo, the National Gallery of Art, the Holocaust Museum, the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens, the U.S. Capitol, the Library of Congress, the U.S. Supreme Court, all of the national monuments, and probably a whole host of things I’ve missed or forgotten, are completely free. What other city can top that?
Afternoon Delight
Who are we to argue with such a spirited tradition? After a stroll past the White House, we stopped at the Round Robin Bar in the Willard Intercontinental Hotel a few blocks from the president’s digs for an afternoon cocktail. (Technically this was “literary research.” If you’d like to know which famous writers tied one on here, click over to NovelDestinations.com.)
Fixings for Mint Juleps sit on top the bar, waiting for weary sightseers like us to sample the Round Robin’s signature drink. Kentucky senator Henry Clay introduced the (not-for-lightweights) libation to the nation’s capital in the 1850s, and it’s still mixed using his recipe. And yes, it stands the test of time.
Meet Brian and Shannon
In 2010 Brian and Shannon sold most of their worldly possessions, packed the rest in an RV, and set out on the first leg of a global travel adventure.
For the literary minded traveler:
