#a two-sided fireplace and a tile fireplace las vegas interior decorating

[birdcageromance]

Bedroom - Master

[travelingtheusa]

MARYLAND

7 Jan 2017 (Sat) – It snowed off and on all day.  We went into town to get some propane.  We’ve been going through a bottle about every three days. At least the camper is staying warm. The furnace, the fireplace, and the ceramic heater in the bedroom have all combined to keep us warm and comfortable.

     After getting the propane, we stopped at The Tender Rib, a BBQ take-out place.  We brought the food back to the camper.  After lunch, we did the laundry.  While the laundry was going, we went to the BX to do some shopping.  The day went fast.  

 6 Jan 2017 (Fri) – We took the MetroRail into Washington today to see Ford’s Theater.  The subway stop was at Gallerie Place and left us with a four block walk to the theater. It was a long, cold walk.  The interior had a very nice museum and gift shop. The theater was plush looking and well decorated.  They are still doing performances there.  The box where the Lincolns sat is available to look at behind a piece of Plexiglas. The museum had the actual derringer that shot the president on display.  The story of Lincoln’s presidency was thoroughly told, along with Booth’s story.

     After the theater, we walked across the street to the Petersen house where they took Mr. Lincoln after he was shot and where he ultimately died. The bedroom he was in was very small. It must have been very crowded with all the people attending to him.

     Next to the house was another museum.  Rising in a thick column in the center of a winding staircase that rose three stories high was a pile of books written about Abraham Lincoln.  It contained more than 15,000 books.  And more have been written since.  The President is the most written about person in the world.

     On the walk back to the MetroRail, we stopped at the Smithsonian Museum of American Art and Portraiture.  There was a section with portraits of all the presidents that was very nice.  Next to each portrait was a small descriptor of the president and something about his term or other aspect of his life.  There were paintings of people and landscapes that were also nice.  Then there was the “modern” section with stuff called art.  A video showed a man laying underwater with his eyes closed not moving.  Another video had a group of six people all standing frozen in place.  One person would slowly move a limb, then another one would move something.  Just weird!

     When we got back to the parking lot, it was starting to snow.  A winter storm (Helena) is sweeping across from the west to the southeast.  That is below Maryland.  Just crazy! We stopped into the office and extended our stay here two days in order to wait out the storm.

5 Jan 2017 (Thu) – We drove to Arlington today to take a tour of The Pentagon.  There was the usual parking challenge with our big ass truck.  After parking what seemed like a gazillion miles away, we stopped for a bite to eat.  We then walked through a tunnel that crossed under a major roadway to check in.  There was the airport type screening where we had to put coats and belts and stuff in baskets and then walk through an X-ray machine. There were signs all over the place advising that photography was not allowed.  After sitting around for an hour, four young servicemen (one from each service) called the tour group of about 50 people into a large room.  The group was split into smaller groups.  We were placed in a group of about 20 people and followed a young Navy man for the next hour.  

     The tour was both something of a surprise and a disappointment. There were wide aisles with shops like florists, luggage, jewelry, candy, cafeterias and food courts, etc. It was very much like a large shopping mall.  The guide walked down several corridors, taking us up and down escalators, around corners, past wall after wall of displays about all kinds of military related topics.  The only place the group lingered was at the 9-11 memorial room and chapel.  For one hour, we walked one and a half miles and never got a chance to stop and look at any of the information lining the walls. It felt like we were given the bum’s rush.  And while we discovered that there are 17 miles of corridors, and you can get anywhere in the building within seven minutes, we really didn’t learn anything about what goes on at The Pentagon.  It would have been nice to hear something about their mission and what they do there.

     After the tour, we walked around outside the building to The Pentagon Memorial garden.  It was a lovely tribute.  There were 184 victims in the attack.  The same number of benches were arrayed in the garden.  Each bench had the name of a victim inscribed on it and was placed over a small pool of water that lights up at night.  There are 84 trees planted around the garden that will give the area shade when they are fully grown.  Time lines were stretched across the area to show the ages of the victims – the youngest was 3 and the oldest was 71.

      We walked back to the truck with a light snow beginning to blow around.  Since tomorrow is supposed to be really cold, we decided to go to Fort Washington. When we got there, we realized we had been there before.  Oh, well. We’ll have to look over past pictures from now on to make sure we don’t repeat that mistake again.

4 Jan 2017 (Wed) – We went out to get propane this morning. While we were out, we thought we would stop and get some breakfast.  We could not find a deli or diner anywhere.  Trip Advisor gave us names of restaurants in the area but they were either not breakfast oriented (i.e., Chinese or Italian food) or they did not open until 11:00 a.m. Weird.  We finally went back on base to the food court in the Base Exchange only to find no breakfast food there either.  We got back in the truck and drove over to a Burger King on base and got the typical bacon, egg, and cheese on a croissant.  It was the end of the breakfast hour and we got the dried out leftovers that hadn’t been thrown out yet.  

     After we brought the propane back to the camper, we drove to the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.  It is the largest Catholic Church in North America and one of the ten largest churches in the world.  The basilica is the tallest habitable building in Washington, D.C., and took over 30 years to build (and it’s still not finished).  Over one million people visit the basilica every year. The place was so beautiful!  There was a long aisle with columns on each side, and dozens of knaves, chapels, and confessionals along the sides.  Millions of 1”x1” tiles were used to create mosaics everywhere.  There were domed ceilings and muraled walls.  Everything in the Basilica was devoted to the Virgin Mary and there were many rooms dedicated by nations around the world.  Next door were large stone buildings that serve as the Catholic University of America and the headquarters for the Conference of Catholic Bishops.  We spent an hour and a half wandering around the building marveling at the craftsmanship, artistry, and colors of the various tiles.

     We drove to the National Harbor next.  It was a delightful town with lots of shops, brownstones, and restaurants.  A sculpture called “The Awakening” made of stainless steel or aluminum was in the sand. It was pretty weird.  There were bronze statues along a median down the main street called The American Way.

    We took a ride on the Capital [sic] Wheel.  It is a large Ferris wheel with 42 cars on the edge of the pier looking down the Potomac River.  It was not as large as the wheel in Las Vegas.  The cars in Vegas hold 25 people.  This one only held four people.  We had dinner at a place called Succotash and then drinks at a wine bar.  It was a good day.

3 Jan 2017 (Tue) – We packed up everything this morning then drove to the AMC (Air Mobility Command) Museum across the street.  No matter how we drove around, we just couldn’t find a way through the fence.  We wound up driving back off base, around the perimeter, and into the entrance of the museum. SO glad we took the time to visit the museum.  Unfortunately, it was raining pretty hard.  That made it difficult to explore the aircraft parked outside.  We walked around the inside and looked at aircraft and various displays.  One of the volunteers came over to talk to us and we expressed our disappointment at not being able to see the planes parked outside.  He put on his coat and walked us out to a C5 Galaxy where he opened the aircraft and let us go inside.  That plane was huge!  He then walked us back inside and gave us a tour of the former control tower.  It was a very enjoyable tour.

     We returned to the camper, finished packing up, and departed.  It was two hours to Andrews Air Force Base (AFB) in Maryland.  The campground is old and the sites are close together.  The campground is located at the southern end of the base and is right next to a major highway.  Let’s hope the traffic noise isn’t loud.  

    During the drive here, Paul noticed that the bedroom slide was not fully retracted.  We pulled over and pulled it in but driving with the slide open in the rain meant we would get water inside.  This is every camper’s nightmare – getting water damage in the RV.  When we got to the campground, we checked the floor around the bed and found significant water damage.  We removed the books stored there, vacuumed the water, and put a heater on the area.  Hopefully, this will help dry everything out.