The LONGEST Day!!

After a suitably long rest we woke at 10 am ready to take on Washington, our full day was going to be FULL. We started by heading in the wrong direction only for 1 block to our new local starbucks in order to indulge ourselves but this proved to be impossible as we couldn’t sit anywhere and they didn’t have bagels....OMG!

So we back tracked and continued along M street our destination Key Bridge to cross into the state of Virginia and the county of Arlington, so I am informed. Along the way we trusted that the rash of starbucxium would have spread westwards in the city! After 4 blocks we were starting to sweat not only form the 35 degree heat but also withdrawal symptoms from starbucks breakfast!!! Still no starbucks....would we have to resort to McDonalds? Thankfully the newly addicted Christoph looked to his right and spotted the Green umbrellas and odd mermaid sign STARBUCKS...can you believe it he chose starbucks over McDonalds....so proud am I!!!

After attempting to start writing day ones blog we gave up in favour of getting the day underway...thought we would do it in stages as we walked...we continued along our route and visited A and F...we have to, it is now tradition that we identify with every store possible! And with that we came to the Key Memorial (guy who created the star spangled banner anthem) and they also named a bridge after him which we duly crossed. Time for water!! Walking across a bridge is hard work! Thank you starbucks they give free tap water and Ice! We soon found ourselves crossing of the Highway which mongo had Identified as the marker for the Iwo Jima statue; our first glimpse was that of a flag, the stars and stripes and it was huge.

As the statue emerged through the trees we were surprised, firstly at the size of the statue, as this picture shows Chris is suddenly a midget;

Secondly we were surprised at the lack of people here.
The statue really does have a commanding view over the Capital City, with the Capitol in the very distance and Washington (spiky one) and Lincoln memorials.

We moved on to Arlington cemetery;

As we emerged over the hill that separates Iwo Jima and Arlington we, well mongo, were shocked at the sight, white war graves everywhere.

Chris having been to the French war graves only last year had more of an idea what this sight would be, whilst for Mongo it had been a good 14 years if not more since I had seen them.

We entered the Cemetery and were met by some of the most recent American causalities in Afghanistan, yet to be commended to burial, one had died less the 2 weeks ago; as we moved further in to the cemetery we saw a grave sight prepared for burial. The information we got at the visitor centre identified that if the flags are at half mast solders are being buried that day. As it turns out a good 3 or 4 were being buried, we heard one (the gun salute) and saw Navy and Army preparation for funeral parades, horse and carriage included.

We joined the crowd’s pilgrimiging to the Kennedy Memorial and Grave

A prominent position in the Cemetery for one of the nation’s favourite presidents. The grave marked by the eternal flame was extremely solemn buried with his wife Jacqueline and with memorials to his two children one unnamed daughter who lived less than 24hrs in the same year JFK died and a 2 month old son Patrick that the Kennedys lost 2 years before.

Ahead of his grave is part of his inaugural speech, engraved in granite in parts is illegible and only legible on an angle in other parts a shame really; To the left lie his two brothers Edward and ....

With that we moved on to the tomb of the unknown soldier, that has a constant guard of honour, it was extremely quiet as the solider marched up and down the same 15ft, wouldn’t fancy that job in this heat.

It seems sad though that so many visit the tomb of the Unknown soldier yet as we continued to wonder the cemetery we saw maybe 2 other visitors looking at the graves; not taking any recognition from those who were never identified but if you see and pay respects to one you should do the same for the other, named or not. Similarly Chris was upset to see that, unlike the European war graves, those higher ranking members of the military, her Generals and Admirals etc, had much grander, bolder grave sites than those lower ranking soldiers. Surely if death is the great equaliser then those who’ve died serving their country deserve the same recognition as leaders.

We went to the south east edge of the cemetery as it was here that we would be able to see the pentagon; as it was the best view was that we saw from the north of the cemetery, ah well.

We were now getting quite thirsty so we returned to the Visitor Centre thinking they would have water for sale or something.....no they didn’t! They had water fountains that produced warm water...not exactly refreshing! And so we headed back to D.C this time via the Arlington Memorial Bridge. As we crossed we witnessed sights that following 9/11 would scare anyone; the flight path of aeroplanes from Washington national airport was directly over the pentagon and up the Potomac....even I was terrified.

We arrived back into DC and headed to find a drink from somewhere....and we were charged through the teeth for it...$12 for 2 waters a tiny Pepsi and an Orange Juice! We headed to see the Lincoln memorial

Chris was really hungry and McDonalds was his meal of choice so having seen how polite the woman in the Lincoln memorial shop was with another customer, Mongo plucked up the courage to ask while paying for Patches...

“Could you tell me where the nearest MacDonald is please?” to which I got the sharp response “NO” and with that she busied herself behind the till. What, is it a F***ing secret love, by now both Chris and I were getting fed up with the attitude of some of the staff in public places, coffee shops, gift shops etc. The only decent person we have had help us was our waiter at Hard Rock last night. Our rage wasn’t helped by the heat we can see that now as we both at stages wanted to kill each other....the arguments solved by silence the usual! We had wanted to get to the Capitol aswell, which it was eventually agreed this wasn’t going to happen.

We thus ventured up to the Washington Memorial. A giant spike effectively....its significance we are not sure but it was freaking tall, it is 165 blocks high Mongo is as tall as 3! They ran out of money when building it to so, half is Marble the other half is granite! You can just about see the change in colour of the blocks on the photo.

From here we headed north, to find the McDonalds we had seen yesterday, we thought we would pass by the White House

See if the Obama’s wanted to join us....unfortunately Barack was signing some important bill or something!!!

We enjoyed Nuggets, Chips and Ice Cream and sat for 1 ½ hours....not such fast food!! Next to us were a mother and daughter who spent longer in the restaurant than us, they had a drink that was it and spent the whole time doing puzzles uttering probably 2 words to each other....wow!! Even with our lack of energy we could do more!!

With that we headed for the hotel the plan was for Mongo to write the blog in starbucks while Christoph returned to get the tripod for night pictures....yey!! We headed for the white house, it was beautifully lit up; On the North side of the White House

You can get much closer that on the south side which by the time we got to it had a further 10 meters blocked off which pushed us further back, but with his whopper Betsy (Chris’ super zoom lens) this distance was nothing!!!!

From here we went to the Washington Monument. Situated in the centre of the Mall we had awesome views of it obviously,

Lincoln memorial

and The Capitol building

From by this time it was 9.45pm....I know it was bad but Mongo really wanted to see the FDR (Roosevelt Memorial) the most recent presidential memorial completed in 1997. En route was Jefferson equally as impressive;

Despite the late hour there were still a number of tours going on, so people were around which gave a little more confidence to Christoph...I hope; I’m sure he will think it was worth it....but won’t admit that, to me anyway....apparently I tricked him!She bloody did trick me, the occasional comment about how she had really wanted to go to the FDR memorial but she understood that she’d pushed me too far today... take a few more pictures... ‘But the Jefferson monument is just along this main road and could we go and see that... no you’re right we should get back’...take a few more pictures... ‘Should we go then, to Jefferson?’ ‘ARRRRRGH Fine lets go, if we get raped you are so going first!’... silence while walking... ‘Thanks for taking me to the last two presidents man’‘It’s fine bu... HANG ON TWO!!!’ ‘Yeah well FDR is right next two Jefferson...’ (right next to = about ½ mile away) – Exaduration!!FDR memorial is made up of four water feature memorials,

Significant to each term in office he served, four in all despite dying in office during the first year of his 4th term (1945) It is still classed as one. Known as America’s war president, people in the UK will know him as part of the big three; Churchill, Stalin and FDR; provided they paid attention in history. He also is responsible for America’s entry into the Second World War when it began in 1941... hang on something’s wrong there! However more significantly he started the craze of First Dogs with his Westie, Fala, the first famous White House dog a tradition continued right through to Bo the current white house dog! This is also symbolised in the memorial...

Of course just one photo we took whilst at tea with the Obama's!!

With that we returned to the hotel, a bath!! We could have salted the sea with salt we had on our skin today....that is what we had some SALT and vinegar Crisps to and of course the McDonalds fries earlier replenishment!!!!!

Without a ruler it was difficult to determine the actual distance walked today....I think it was around 13 ½ miles...well done Chris!!! And with that knowledge safely in his little head and the idea that NYC will be easier because it will have McDonalds fairly regularly and everything is gridded!! With that we crashed out!! Looking forward to the last Amtrak Journey tomorrow and our final destination THE BIG APPLE woohoo!! (Sorry Ma...going to Tony's on Friday or Saturday....book a last minute flight??!!)

The Adventures of Mongo and The Boy Written and experienced by

Kate ‘The cunning deceiver’ Davies

And Chris ‘Please note that in 1814 we burned the Capitol, White House and Supreme Court... All Washington’s buildings are indirectly thanks to British engineering...’ Davies

The Welsh go to Washington

Washington D.C. Capital of the greatest country in the world, Land of the free, home of the brave.... HA! J I’m sorry I can’t do it... OK so Washington is the capital of the United States of America. We headed to collect our bags, a twenty minute wait .... but there we are....last time it has to be done!! We were asked by a New Zealander where we were from, the United Kingdom sir; "Ah I thought you were speaking proper English...". Why thank you sir!!! A conversation with himself and his wife, identified we hadn't seen the worst of New Orleans; in huge areas of the city houses still remained empty and she showed us pictures as they described the suffering the city was still evidently undergoing.



Our departure from the train area of the station identified a huge stunning entrance hall, wow it truly was amazing, a gold (we think leaf) patterned ceiling, with marble everywhere you looked.



The exterior was equally stunning, we thought we should return later when we don't have to suitcases and 2 bags to lug around also. We departed the station and soon arrived at the hotel, the Westin Washington D.C, we were suspecting that we would not be able to get our room yet; much to our delight we were, our room faces the interior of the hotel, after the noise of the last two nights this was perfect!



We headed of down Massachusetts avenue, the road we had minutes before come up in a cab heading for Union station so we could photograph it! We came across the OLD Post Office. It had all the post boxes as well as a museum....I guess a lot of old stamps and stuff??!!



We arrived here at the beautiful Union Station, but before we admired and photographing the beautiful architecture we had a job to do... the golden arches of Mc Donald’s awaited.It would appear that here in the Capital the MD’s is so good that they’ve named it twice

Suitably filled, we ventured outside to the front of the station where we were struck by two things, the amazing station facade, and the immense heat, seriously it’s hot out here, uncomfortably sticky hot Kate’s says it’s good for us because we sweat which stops us dehydrating and exploding or something like that... I was not listening... but the station’s cool eh?

Yes it was hot but what I said was that it was a better heat then New Orleans as we didn't have the humidity here which allows you to thermoregualte more effectively!! Anyway... We ventured on to 1st Avenue heading for the Capitol, Library of Congress and Supreme court. Having wondered through avenues of congress / governmental buildings, circling one!! We took the customary photograph of the police...this was a special one though!! It was capitol police!!

And we arrived at the supreme court.....wow.....aparently this is like Rome....

No Mongo you weren't listening! What I said is that this is what I imagine Rome would look like if the Empire had not fallen, and been burned to the ground by Huns, goths etc... Mind you Washington itself has been burned to the ground a couple of times, mainly by the British.... oops. I've just read in the guide book that in 1814 we burned the original White House down, to Americans that might make the British seem bad but I say that thanks to us the beautiful building that stands today was built because of us... It's all about perspective. anyway the supreme court...

isn't Rome more ruins??!! ... Right next door was the Library of Congress, the largest library in the world the national reading rooms are here...along with...according to National Treasure 2 some presidential book!!!

An absolutely amazing building both on its interior and exterior, we spent a good while exploring the creation of Independence exhibit, a much fairer representation of the War of Independence than others we've been to around the country. You can't take picture of the exhibits or of the reading rooms but you can take picture of the entrance hall etc...but Chris forgot to download that one so you will have to wait for that!!

From the Library of Congress Steps we could see the Capitol, not any normal Capitol building, No this was the nations Capitol, it is on the steps of this building that Barack Obama give his inaugural speech as have previous presidents!

We headed down to the entrance to go inside only to be turned away because I had a sports bottle for my water....it is a threat to security, don't have a clue why but that is what we were told. SO that will have to be done on some other day...I hope we have time! So we used the time to take our exterior pictures of the capitol.

Look is a giant Mongo.....

Ok so it was the way were taking the photo's...well a giant we look at this angle!!...

Looking down the Mall from the Capitol Steps was cool, in January 2009 this Mall was packed with people, in the distance is Washington's Memorial, and in the foreground is the reflecting pool

Chris got arty again as we tried to block out the tower of scaffolding on the side of the building!!

Chris poses with the Capitol building behind and its reflection in the pool....

Shame about the slight breeze we can't get the proper reflection....Mongo repeats the photo.....

Such a grand building though....

Next up it was time for the National Archives....home to the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights and the Constitution of the United States. When we arrived we saw a queue to get in....not a problem we weren't going to miss this. We took the opportunity whilst on the opposite side of the road to photograph the building...having worked out the traffic....we managed to get an empty road....amazing!!!

We eventually got in and were able to see the 3 most important documents to America, the Declaration of Independence though is suffering, the signature are barely readable only legible one is that of Washington...and that is only just! Apparently it was rolled incorrectly back in the 1950's as a result suffered sun damage during transit.

At the achieves you could explore national investigations such as JFK and Lincoln assassinations and the Titanic disaster, aswell as the moon landing and family examine your family history....if you are American that is.

Next we headed north to the Hard Rock Cafe passing the FBI building and Naval Memorial. The FBI building was named after J.E. Hoover... that's the guy who invented the hoover ...right..??!! He was the first Head of the FBI.

Again the token cop car...this time FBI Police!!!

We arrived at the Hard Rock and Chris managed to get his Patch the last one in the store...that was lucky! We ate here two, just because it wasn't busy and we could!! A lovely server who's Great Grandfather was from Blackpool, always find something in common...sweet!

We left the HRC and headed for the Hotel, just one more famous sight to see today; the Theatre at which Lincoln himself was assassinated; the Ford Theatre is now a national park monument and a new theatre a joins the scene

Just across the street is the house where he died, with its own plaque...

And with that we headed for the hotel, ready for a mammoth day tomorrow...sorry Chris!!

The Adventures of Mongo and The Boy, written and experienced by

Kate "A Library, some Archives and a Court House... that's a day out!!!" Davies

and

Chris " Don't mention the war....of Independence that is" Davies.

All aboard for Washington DC

So Friday morning dawned and due to effectively spending 5 days on a train basically meaning pre 9am wakes for Chris I allowed him a lie in!!! It was great for me to....having been a early bird yesterday to be laundry lady!!!! Anyway so we woke packed and checked out, an easy transfer to the station allowed us time to go to Starbucks and complete the previous blog that may have found entertaining.
We arrived back to union station to watch as the train went from. ‘ON TIME’ to ‘DELAYED’; how can it be that a train originating at this station be delayed?? Thanks to Union Pacific freight that why.


When we boarded our Sunset limited bound for New Orleans, our carriage attendant Sandi was a hoot, the first we have had to introduce themselves with a handshake. As we settled into our roomette so the screaming started, yes screaming, a family of 4 kids with a father who couldn’t shut them up....thank goodness we were at the opposite end of the carriage! We enjoyed the scenery as we moved from the city to desert not quite, the change is not as obvious as it is in Vegas, the desert was slightly greener here!!

The rivers were carved out in a similar way to the Grand Canyon except but in a significantly smaller scale. the announcement said that at this time of year, this river is normally reduces to the most miniscule trickle, but due to a hurricane experienced in the region in the last 4 weeks the river was up to its normal flow rate for the winter...

Our first stop was dinner, steak and potato; we can’t quite understand this need to place a steak with potato (whether that be mashed or baked) and veg, why not the traditional Chips, or fries as it is here!!! We met a lovely family on their way to New Orleans for a holiday, this was complemented by a fantastic dinner service staff, another first on Amtrak. A delightful sunset along over the Arizona desert greeted us as we returned to our room

And we settled into an evening of top gear before we headed for bed. The next morning Mongo woke to see sun-rise

and got completely freaked out by Chris screaming....OMG it was so scary, it was a dream scream which i think was worse!! Anyway having tossed and turned for 2 hours it was reviled that we were about to arrive in El Paso

and so we set foot in one more state....at 7.45am OH MY GOD!! As we settled back into our room we realised that we will be in Texas longer than we would be in Louisiana despite spending a night there in New Orleans!!! Over lunch we had more great company, a women who has done a similar trip to us, but another person who loved Seattle, that is two in as many days...wow! What did we miss??!! While eating we passed through Alpine

And a little later we came within a few feet of the Mexican border!! Just across the river is Mexico (where the tree line is)...

Our next stop Del Rio....

Had a large border police presence which is normal, this is a common place for immigrants to try and escape into the USA.We continued on having made up the time that we had lost yesterday and we arrived at San Antonio, home of the Alamodome as in Miss Congeniality. At the station was a massive train look at the size of the wheels, I couldn't actually fit the train on my i-phone camera!!..

With that to the city we headed in search of some sustenance along to the riverwalk we went (not a great pic sorry) still busy despite the late hour.

On arrival back at the station we had a quick look at the station it was pretty impressive...the first we spotted was that it hasn’t been called Union station!!! Instead Sunset station!

So we once again boarded the train and to bed we went. Next stop New Orleans . The next day we arrive in New Orleans crossing the Mississippi just outside if the city

We had arrived into New Orleans a good 90mins early, a very annoying taxi driver who told us how much to tip him, the fare was 7.25 we were going to give 10 anyway but he said “$10 minimum” he got $10 on the nose and that was it. However how lucky we did give him what he told us.....more on that in a few lines”
After a slightly drawn out check in we entered our room, not amazing view or anything, but lets face t we really aren’t going to be here long!! We went to head into the city...
”Where are your sun glasses Chris??”
“Here” he says as he touches his t-shirt.
....ummm...after tearing the room apart we figured out they are not here. Thankfully the bell man downstairs was able to get hold of the taxi firm and the taxi driver returned with them....phew. Crisis averted we headed into New Orleans.We explored the river, the French quarter unavoidable really and more!!

Our first stop was artillery park were we found a canon, and had a good very of the Cathedral (Roman Catholic) please note that the canon is pointing away from the Cathedral...nobody's perfect...

It was so humid, we headed for the Cafe de Monde and the famous French donuts....can't think how to spell them....begins with a B??!! DAD???

We wondered around the Market in the French Quarter and listen to some of the Jazz going on in the street, part of the Louis Armstrong festival, beats the current Brecon Jazz anyway!!!

We headed for dinner whilst admiring the city’s architecture

And off to the Hard Rock we went to admire Louis Armstrongs’ trumpet and enjoy a very good dinner!!!

We headed to the river to check out the Natchez boat which were very impressive machines

And so we returned to the hotel not looking forward to our 5.30 wake up tomorrow!!! So we tried to sleep but down below us was road works....at 11pm.....12am....1am. Eventually we got to sleep and next think we knew....ring....ring....ring “This is your wake up call, thank you for staying with doubletree” ohhhhh it was that early it was still dark! We headed for the station, bag dropped and headed for the Magnolia room, For sleeping passengers, we hoped this would include, drinks and a little food we could sneak on the train....just coffee...bummer!
We boarded the train; a viewliner which meant each roomette had a toilet in the room. We later discovered this was the only toilet....great that will make using the facilities in the middle of the night interesting won’t it!! Anyway we also realised that this train doesn’t actually communicate to its passengers either. Only speakers are in the corridor and any announcement made you can’t hear anyway. We had no idea what our attendants name was, we just hope we get off in Washington as they don’t announce stops either!
Over lunch we sat with a lovely couple from Birmingham Alabama, on their way home, lunch was ok...service not great, nor my food; Chris’ though was better than his last one!

Our evening was spent flying through the Georgia countryside, sorry Kate nowhere near Augusta... but a stop in Atlanta, Georgia allowed us to claim another state visited....Yayyy! we went to bed unsure as to when exactly our train would arrive in Washington D.C... a comfortable nights sleep was not expected.

An uncomfortable nights sleep later we awoke to find ourselves at a station, D.C.!!!! no it wasn't but it was only about 30 minutes away. prepared for disaster we'd packed up our bags last night so all we had to do was wait. Finally the call came, D.C. 10 minutes as we crossed the Potomac River from Virginia into the District of Columbia (D.C.) familiar sights came into view, the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and the U.S. Capitol centre of Washington D.C. headquarters of (as many Americans say) the finest Governments money can buy... we're not here to judge.

The Adventures of Mongo and The Boy written and experienced by

Kate 'the chronic insomniac' Davies

and

Chris 'whose body contains the unquiet spirit of Olaf the Hairy, High Chief of all the Vikings...who screamed a lot' Davies