After a "Disney World" day's worth of activity, Ryan and I decided our original plan for our final day in D.C. would have to be postponed for the next time we're in town. We really wanted to take a drive to Arlington, but we weren't convinced the girls would enjoy another a day of walking around outside or quite understand the magnitude of the space. Instead, our amazing hosts recommended the Udvar-Hazy Air & Space Museum.
I've never been more excited about a change of plans in the history of ever. I mean look at this place.
This place was amazing - filled from end to end and top to bottom with more history than you can imagine. In the form of air crafts! We were all instantly excited about the morning ahead.
Our first stop was at the IMAX theater to watch Journey to Space - a ridiculously amazing look at how NASA is planning the first manned mission to Mars. I left regretting that I was not an astronaut and deeply trying to convince the kids that at least one of them should be.
My favorite part about the entire day was seeing this beautiful piece of American history. How incredible is this?? The Discovery flew more missions and carried more astronauts than any other spacecraft in history. The Discovery was 27 years old when it flew its last mission and had travelled to space 39 times! GAH - just so stinking cool! I think we could have spent all day in this one section of the museum - so must to see and learn!
Instead we walked up and down, each picking out our favorite air craft designs, shapes, colors, and names and just had the best time taking the day easy and slow.
We finished the visit with a quick trip up to the observation tower before heading back to the Gorrie's.
This is the part where I should tell you we quickly made it home with no problem, but alas... the truth was that we almost ran out of gas on the freeway, in the heat of the day, stuck in traffic, in a major city. We looked up the nearest gas station and lucked out that it was 1 mile away... we pulled up... and it was SHUT DOWN. In a miracle of miracles we made it an additional 4 miles and did not die.
The drama earned everyone one more dip in the pool...
I 110% recommend taking the time to drive to Virginia to visit this A&S Museum... I do not recommend the part about running out of gas. I do recommend staying with amazing friends that have wine waiting for you when you get home.
And just like that, our days in D.C. were done and we were ready to head out on the next part of our adventure....
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