Happy Anniversary (Part 2)

I ordered tickets for us to go to the top of the Washington Monument at 4:00 P.M.  I'd never done this before, even though I'd been to the monument numerous times.  After a very fast geography lesson from a park service guide (he seriously said everything so fast, I only caught a few words), we were shepherded inside to the elevator.  The elevator took 70 seconds to reach the observation deck, which was at 500 feet.  The pictures were taken through the glass windows, which is why they're a bit fuzzy, but you get the idea.  It was really cool to be able to see all over the city.  The first is of the Lincoln Memorial and the reflecting pool.

This is the Capital Building
After a slower descent on the elevator (it slowed and opened the windows so you could see all the stones that were given by states, countries, and organizations) we headed toward the World War II memorial.  This hadn't been completed the last time we were in town (way back in 2003 when Dan and I first began dating).  We wanted to see it and get some pictures for his parents, who were with us the last time.  This is Dan standing in front of the fountains and water in the middle of it.
I'm in front of the Atlantic side.  It's actually really huge and beautiful.  
We were going to try to walk to the Lincoln Memorial after that since Dan wanted to see that again, but by this time we were both tired, sore, and getting cold.  We decided to head back to the hotel.  I got this picture of the White House on our walk back.
Saturday night we went for dinner at McCormick and Schmick's, a seafood restaurant I'd wanted to try in Baltimore.  I will admit a large part of the reason we decided on that restaurant was its close proximity to our hotel.  My feet, legs, and back were killing me from walking around for over 7 hours during the day, and while Dan was a bit better off than I was, he was feeling some pain as well.  We had a good dinner, then like losers, went back to the hotel to simply hang out.  I think we were asleep by 10:15 (which was our late night!)  It was a far cry from the days living in Waldorf and just getting out to the clubs and bars at that time!   I think we both enjoyed two nights of sleeping without hearing every sound and movement on the baby monitor though...it will be awhile before we enjoy that luxury again :)