DC, Day Two

Tuesday morning we started the day out by visiting the Holocaust Memorial Museum. We didn't even have to wait in line for tickets because Joel is a veteran. The museum was really something, and almost overwhelming. I really wanted to read every informational display and every caption of every photo. I couldn't of course. I read as much as I could, and we still took three hours to go through the museum. 

It was really interesting, and started with how Hitler and the Nazis came to power. Before we started we were given "identification papers", which was the story of a Jewish person in WWII, and what happened to them. You find out at the end of the papers if they lived or died.

The whole thing got pretty emotional by the time you near the end. At least it was emotional for me. There was a section about the children of the Holocaust near the end of the museum, and that just about pushed me over the edge. I found out that my girl died at a concentration camp, which almost made me cry. Joel's guy survived, so that was a happy ending.

After the Holocaust Museum we walked over to the Smithsonian Castle, had some lunch, and headed to the Museum of Natural History. This was one of Joel's favorite places we went, I think. It was really interesting with a lot of cool and fun stuff to see. We went to the Museum of American History after that. We went a little over an hour before it closed, so we really didn't have much time to enjoy it. We were able to see some cool stuff, though. I do wish we'd had more time at that museum.

It was raining some that evening. We walked around and headed to the back of the White House to see it better. (We'd seen it from the Washington Monument the day before.) Then we headed to dinner at the one fancy/expensive place we ate while we were there: Central. The food was quite delicious. Especially the desert, which I had to take a picture of. The chocolate bar was our favorite, and definitely one of the best things we ate while we were in DC!

 A huge collection of shoes taken at the camps during WWII.

They had a Hall of Remembrance at the end of the Holocaust Museum.

 The lobby of the Natural History Museum.

Outside the Natural History Museum.

 The Smithsonian Castle as seen from the steps of the Natural History Museum.

 At the American History Museum.

 This is the Sunstone Capital from the original Nauvoo temple!

 The original ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz.

 Part of the Berlin Wall.

The chocolate bar is just indescribable!