Washington DC Pt 1

Sorry it's taking so long to get these up (if there is anyone even looking) Im just getting distracted all the time, but I shall endeavour to get more up. 

Washington DC

Day 1

From Baltimore I travelled to DC, arriving about midday. I walked from Union Station to the hostel, which was not far and gave me a chance to have my first looks at the city. I was really feeling the vibe of this city, really weird thing to say, but I thought the place seemed awesome to me. Once I dropped my stuff off at the hostel I decided to walk the North West of the City. I wanted to go Bens Chilli Bowl and that was all that I really had in mind. But that walk was amazing, the houses there are so cool, there are a bunch of big roundabouts with statues. When I got up to U street I found Bens and got myself the famous Half-Half smoke chilli dog. So good, the chilli not to coarse not to fine, the dog smokey cooked to have the perfect pop on impact of teeth. It was a great dog, which they served with potato chips. 

From here I walked down U street, where there were heaps of signs for a walking trail of the black history of the area. I followed this walk because it was cool to read all this history, that I didn’t even know about. The trail walks you down U and down around some of the other streets. It spanned from music to food, to the civil rights movement. I got lost somewhere near the end so I ended up going to a park at the top past U street. It looked over the city but the view was blocked by an apartment block which sucked. The park itself was cool, it was made in memory of a president and has a bottom level and top level. One thing I found out about the city or that area was there was a couple walks that took you around the neighbourhood. I couldn't really see anyone else doing it but I enjoyed them, and I'd highly recommend taking some time out to learn the history of the area. After this I walked down 14^th street, one of these hip, restaurant, bar and shopping streets. Its full of gastro pubs, cheap meals, antique shops, juice shops all sorts of things you’d associate with a hip and popular neighbourhood. I found a place called Pig, highly rated on Yelp, so I decided to try it. I ordered tapas style with some of their small plates, and since it was a restaurant called Pig I ordered all pig. First a pig’s head bacon, thick cut, great meat to fat ratio, and paired with a sweet and hot mustard sauce. I also ordered a pigs trotters deep fried, a with sweet chilli sauce, which was a lot more meaty than I expected. My last dish I ordered was pig’s tail served rib style. This was my first time trying pigs tail so it was good, more fatty than I anticipated but cause of the skin around the tail the fat didn’t melt as much as with the other two dishes. Overall an outstanding meal, very happy I choose it and got a chance to try these different body parts of the pig.  

Day 2 

So today I had another freetourbyfoot booked for the national mall, and a couple of the iconic DC monuments, at around 1pm. So I started out earlyish that morning, try fit the Museum of Natural History in before it. Just for those that don't know, certainly I didn't until I planned my trip, there are like a million museums here and they are all FREE. Yep free, and they are amazingly curated, and well worth seeing. Obviously I had been to the AMNH in NYC earlier, so this museum had some similarities, but there was still new stuff to see. I thought it had a really good marine animal exhibit, really giving the chance for people to see the impact of humans on the environment but also the chance to learn about the environment and animals as is. Lots of interactive features as you walk around and a load of information and exhibits to look at. I did like the fact that even though it is free there is so many staff there, either helping or doing hands on stuff for people to hold or get involved in. It was around lunchtime so I decided to go get some food, but there wasn't much around. It's mainly government buildings around the mall so not much choices. I settled for a hamburger from an interesting joint not too far from the mall. Standard with fries, slightly thinner patty than what I had been getting previously and somewhat more greasy 

So the tour was starting from the George Washington memorial, through the ww2 memorial, Vietnam memorial, and finishing at the famous Abe Lincoln memorial. The tour guide was good, it was her first tour but she handled herself well. Good information, stuff like the George Washington memorial has like two different colour bricks cause of the construction being delayed. We also got a chance to explore the war memorials ourselves which was nice because we weren't loud in those areas. And then the reflecting pool and Abe Lincoln memorial, just iconic and amazing. I think the whole tour was worth it, you get some cool facts and see a lot for a short time. 

After the tour I walked to the Thomas Jefferson memorial. It was a nice walk, bit outside the mall and so not as many people. But the lake was frozen but starting to defrost so at the edge you'd hear cracking and see the ice splitting. After reaching the Thomas Jefferson memorial I wanted to go to Jessie's seafood, which easnt too far. Jessie's was one of many shops in a outdoor seafood market. Some were purely selling raw seafood others cooked and raw, and Jessie's was cooking anything raw you brought over. What I wanted was a blue crab cooked in old bay spice, but seriously failed at this. Firstly I wasn't pushy enough so I couldn't get the attention of the guy over the other people. Secondly I gave up and came back and thought I'd got the other side to get someone's attention but failed again. Then I thought instead id try crawfish. Got a dozen old bay on top, Walked to the hill to have a seat and eat, but as I opened it I realised they were raw. I was debating on going back to get them cooked but gave up cause the place was so busy. I ended up walking holding these frozen crawfish all the way to the hostel debating whether I should cook them or not. In the end I chose not, I didn't want to ruin my first crawfish eating so I'd save the chance for another time. That evening I went back to 14th st and went to this place called Amsterdam falafel. Essentially it's like a do it your own  subway but with falafel. It was cheap, big sized, I filled mine with so much, and really good as well. I wish they had this in brisbane cause I would definitely eat this regularly.

That night I cruised back to the hostel, there was a playoff game happening so I thought Id try catch some of it. So happened I run into one of the people I stayed with in Philly. We watched the game and then decided to go out to a bar to watch to watch the next game. One of the other people that was watching also decided to join, so we went to a bar, after a quick stop at 5 guys for them to grab a burger and fries. The nightlife was pretty quiet, it was a very chill night, but we did go to a few bars and at all of them, in the warm inside it was very packed.