Washington, D.C.: Day 2

My favorite thing about this trip is that it was all unplanned. That's right. This organized girl did not have a typed out itinerary!! And it made it so much more fun. My buddy Kim lived near D.C. for a bit, so she wrote me a detailed email that was SO helpful of spots she suggested (thanks, Kim!!), and Ryan and I added ideas to her list. So we did have a list of things we wanted to do, but we didn't have set plans. So each day, we decided what we wanted to mark off the list!

One thing that wasn't on our list was renting bikes. 

OH MY WORD. If I were to tell anybody to do one thing in D.C., it would be rent bikes! They have an amazing system with stations to rent and return all over the area. It was only $7 per person for 24 hours and you could rent and return as much as you wanted in that 24 hours! And you didn't have to worry about locking your bike up and we could take a taxi or the subway if we were in more of a hurry.

An added bonus was the location of our hotel. We stayed at the Marriot by the National Zoo and it was right next to Rock Creek Park. 

People. It was like the Virginia Creeper in the middle of D.C.!! 

I had such a misconception that D.C. was going to be dirty with buildings everywhere and fast-paced like New York City, but it was the complete opposite!!

So on Saturday, we rented bikes at a station next to our hotel and rode through Rock Creek Park. Which just so happens to be slightly downhill the whole way! It was so gorgeous and so much fun.

The trail runs right next to a main road and runs next to the Patomac River:

Again with the amazing Autostitch App!

We rode in front of the White House:

 And behind (which technically may be the front because this is the side on our dollar bills!)

#1 on Kim's list was eating at Old Ebbitt Grill near the White House. It was AMAZING. Local hormone-free beef! My burger was off the charts.

You can't tell from this pic how neat the interior of the restaurant was. Very classy, coat racks next to all the tables, old paintings. Let's say we felt a bit underdressed with t-shirts. :)

 Ryan's raw oysters. Yuck. :) But apparently they were amazing.

 We then rented bikes again and rode to the Air & Space Museum. 

Terry Wade, these pictures are for you! 

(My dad is quite the airplane fanatic and the whole time I was in there I kept thinking of how much he would love it!)

Mine and Ryan's favorite exhibit was Orville and Wilbur Wright. We seriously read through every single thing in there--at least 45 minutes of just soaking up history!

My absolute favorite quote:

"Isn't it astonishing that all these secrets have been preserved for so many years just so that we could discover them!!" ~Orville Wright 

I had no idea they would have actual pieces of history like this:

And the actual propellors from their first plane:

The "Space" part of the Air & Space Museum:

They had to close part of it down while we were there because of a reception. Can you imagine having a wedding reception there!?

We then (thanks to Kim) hopped on the Metro and headed to Alexandria, VA on Kings Street for the evening. It reminded me a lot of Charleston, SC with quaint little shops along the way.

With the help of Yelp (wow, we used this the entire trip to find places to eat!), we found The Majestic.

Oh my. That's all I can say. Local and fresh food, and it was scrumptious.

They made our guacamole appetizer next to our table. I'm talking, fresh avocado and all the ingredients, and made it right there in front of us! 

(A lot of these pics we texted to our families to tell them what we were up to. We generally don't take pics of our food! :) )

I ordered the "Whole Fish" and didn't realize it would be head to tail an entire fish! Our waitress filleted this thing for me! Again, underdressed for such a restaurant. :)

We were so exhausted from such a fun-filled day!