National Archives

Today we went downtown in DC and visited the National Archives. We got to see all the documents, like the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I wish I could have stood there and read them, but there were a jillion people crowded around every display.

They also don't allow flash photography, so I don't have any pictures in there.

We walked a block or two to a sandwich place and had lunch, then got back on the Metro to go home.

I'm such a travel noob. Airplanes? Fun! Metro lines? Fun! The kids were enthralled on the way out, but on the way back they were tired and didn't enjoy it as much.

Going down underground to the metro station is like some creepy version of Disneyland. Everything is dingy and run down, and there's whooshes of air as the trains go by, and roars and whistles and shrieks.

Then you get inside a train, and it roars and bellows, screams and grinds, and generally sounds like the dinosaurs from Jurassic Park, only with reverb. It would be scary, if not for one thing:

You are surrounded by the most bored people on the face of the earth.

People who are falling asleep, they're so bored. Bored people with newspapers, or ipods, or laptops, or big fat books, or anything portable they can amuse themselves with. The ones who don't have those things just sit and doze. A lot of folks enjoyed watching Alex and Holly, who were so excited about the trip. I think they livened up the trip for at least a few people.

So we came home and took naps. I wish we could have hiked around DC more, but doing foot-tours with small children, as well as being six months pregnant, just isn't very fun. We'll have to come back once everybody's older.

And tomorrow, we're homeward bound. Trains today, planes tomorrow!