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During the week that we visited Washington, D.C. it wasn’t as hot as we thought it would be, but the humidity added an extra thick blanket of warmth! That’s when I’m thankful for air conditioning. To start off the journey, we arrived at The Mayflower Hotel on the first day in downtown D.C. and felt welcomed right away.

The Mayflower Hotel opened in 1925 and “as one of the most historic hotels in Washington, DC, The Mayflower Hotel, Autograph Collection has welcomed locals and visitors alike into its elegantly gilded hallways and gloriously appointed spaces for nearly a century – playing host to inaugural balls and ladies who lunch, the famous, the infamous, decades of society weddings and legions of guests who just wanted to be in the center of it all” (themayflowerhotel.com). My grandparents dined there once while they were dating when the hotel’s restaurant was called The Rib Room. Now, their restaurant is called Edgar Bar & Kitchen, named after J. Edgar Hoover who dined at the hotel daily. I had to get a bee’s knees cocktail to match the speakeasy vibes!

My mom went to D.C. for Cabi Clothing’s two day fashion convention so we mostly stayed around the hotel the first few days. We toured around downtown and checked out all the old buildings and made it over to The White House which was a few blocks away. And we also stopped by the Washington Monument. It was so muggy out and hot that I couldn’t stay outside for too long. We stopped by a restaurant for lunch then headed back to the hotel.

The next day we went to the Cabi fashion show to see the new clothes for the upcoming Fall 2024 season. It was held at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor.

The next few days we visited Bethesda, Maryland where my grandma grew up and along the way we stopped at the Clara Barton National Historic Site and saw where Clara Barton, nurse and founder of the American Red Cross, lived. The site is now part of the National Park system.

Next, we drove by where my grandma and her family lived. Her home is now gone and another houses sits in its spot, but I can vaguely remember the area when I visited while I was younger. We stopped for lunch and took it to eat in the parking lot of my grandma’s high school, Walter Johnson High School named after the baseball player. His house is a short drive away. We went to National Harbor that night for dinner and it was an interesting place to stop!

The next day we visited the Korean War Veterans Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. We went around the park area there and all of the sculptures are so beautiful. I’ve been to the Lincoln Memorial before, but it was very nice to see the others. We bought a National Parks stamp passport at the park so now we’re collecting National Park and monument stamps wherever we visit!

During the next few days we visited my great uncle and his family for dinner at a really good restaurant called Carlyle in Arlington, Virginia. We also visited the National Museum of Natural History where we saw all kinds of dinosaur bones as well as the Hope Diamond. Down the street is the National Museum of American History where we could have spent hours looking in every room and exhibit. We saw the First Ladies’ dresses from their respective inaugural balls and their husband’s inaugural ceremonies. I was excited to see Selena Quintanilla’s jacket and boots in the multimedia exhibition along with Dorothy’s ruby slippers, R2-D2 and C-3PO, and much more.

Once we figured out our hotel was across from the ABC News station, it was fun to see anchors outside reporting for Good Morning America as we watched them on the program on TV in the morning! We visited the Capitol building where we got a private tour from one of the staff members of my dad’s friend from volleyball, who is now a Congressman. It was fun to see some of the behind the scene areas that had ramps and flat areas that I could use since most of the other tours use stairs to get around, but it is wheelchair accessible with elevators too.

On our final day we visited George Washington’s house, Mount Vernon. The main level is accessible, but the second level is not. They had a book of the upstairs rooms that I looked at and they also have a virtual tour online. We toured around the grounds and saw the old stables as well as where they still have sheep today. The garden was down the path and on the other side of the garden are the brick slave quarters.

Before we drove to the airport, we drove by the Jefferson Memorial. On the National Parks website, they say that the monument is under construction for accessibility improvements. It will “include the construction of two sloped pathways east and west of the front steps of the memorial. These ramps will significantly decrease the distance of the accessible route from the front of the memorial to the chamber level.” It’s nice to know that improvements are being made. It was a very fun trip and a very historic time to see the east coast. You can check out Part 1 of my Washington, D.C. blog here!