(I would like to preface by saying that Ben took all the pictures on the last 2 days. Unfortunately my computer died when I was trying to get the pictures off of his memory card. So there are only a couple pictures at the bottom....I will try to get the good ones on facebook!)
Part 3
This morning we woke up and ate a yummy breakfast at Founding Farmers, a suggestion from a friend who lives in DC. We then made our way over to the Fat Tire Bike Tours office to start on our segway tour of DC.
The 3 hour tour was an awesome way to see the city in the short amount of time we had. In summary we saw:
The White House
The Washington Monument (you cant go up it at the moment due to the earthquake last year)
The Lincoln Memorial
The Korean War Memorial
The Vietnam War Memorial
The World War II Memorial
The National Mall (including ALL the museums exteriors...next time were going in!!)
The Smithsonian Castle
The Capitol
The National Archives Building
The FBI Building
The Newseum (A new museum all about the news. The outside of the museum had the front page of every major paper in the US and in the world!)
After the tour we grabbed a quick pizza and headed towards Culpeper, Virginia. When we arrived in Culpeper, Wayne took us to see the town's museum which highlighted many of the battles during the Civil War. Many of them occurred very close to the town that stands today.
We then walked around the small downtown, which we learned has earned many awards for "Best Small-Town Downtown" and was nominated for a reality TV show until the station realized they didn’t want to deal with the freezing winters during filming. We saw all the cute shops, including an Oil and Vinegar shop! It was my dream store....the entire store was tanks of different infused oils and vinegars with tasting cups and crackers. They bottle them for you and theyre ready to take home and eat. Wayne generously let Ben and I pick out an oil and a vinegar. We chose the Herbs de Provence oil and Champagne Balsamic Vinaigrette. YUM! After happy hour at a local seafood restaurant we headed back to the house for a delicious steak and potato dinner and spent the rest of the evening talking and playing Apples to Apples.
The next morning we enjoyed the view of the golf course while we ate a homemade breakfast (including Grans Orange Biscuits). Wayne then showed us around a couple holes on the course and Ben and I made our way out of town towards Connecticut!
Part 4
The drive to Connecticut was about 5hours and about $40 in tolls! The trip flew by though compared to our other 12 hour driving days. We arrived in Norwalk and drove up to 7 Ferris avenue. After walking around the house and not seeing Bens roommate, he realized his address was actually 27 Ferris avenue...oops. When we arrived at his ACTUAL apartment we met his roommate, Tom from Wisconsin. When we got Bens stuff in the house, he realized he forgot to follow through on getting a bed from the previous renters....so the first night in his apartment he slept on a futon. He has since been to IKEA and bought a nice bed and a dresser but the initial shock was pretty funny!
After moving in we grabbed the train from Norwalk to Grand Central Station (about a 60 minute ride). We found our hotel which happened to be right across the street from a Chipotle! Since we had a very nice dinner in DC we decided Chipotle would be perfect for our NYE meal!
After dinner we walked all around the Times Square area. It was very crowded and chaotic. I got a little claustrophobic as we were waiting to watch the ball drop. (We were about 15 blocks away from the actual ball but we could still see it). After the ball drop there was a 20 minute firework show above Central Park.
Overall, seeing the ball drop in person was really neat, but I probably wouldn’t do it again. The people watching was pretty great, but not enough to be crammed next to thousands of people for hours :)
The next morning we found a quaint French Restaurant in the West Village called Tartine. It was WONDERFUL! I would recommend it to anyone. Ben liked it so much he wanted to move to the neighbourhood! After brunch, we made our way to the Rockafeller Center and went to the "Top of the Rock" which is the 67th floor of the building. It is a really nice 360 degree view of the city!
Saying goodbye was hard and I wasn’t looking forward to it, but luckily I had a very nice cab driver on the way to the airport who chatted with me the whole way and took my mind off of it!
I get to go back February 10...and Im counting the days!!
Until my next trip....Au Revoir!
