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Entry Twelve: Thursday, June 17, 2004

I am now on my way home to SeaTac Airport; it has been a rough ride so far from turbulence caused by summer storms. Where was I? Oh, yes, after the performances, the Rankin and Kandt-Perrollaz families separated from the rest of the group to go downtown via the subway. That was an adventure into the unknown. We visited two over-flowing Park and Ride stations before deciding our time would be better spent if we parked at the campus and rode the university's shuttle bus into the subway station.

Once at the station, around 1400, we stood in line to obtain all-day subway passes. At a checkpoint, each of us had to yield our all-day tickets to a machine that ate the card and spit it back up on the other side of a plastic barricade. This plastic barricade lifted up to allow passage to the subway if the ticket was verifiable. When we had gone through, we took the stairs to the upper level, a raised subway deck. The subway was soon present; we took it from College Parkway to Washington, D.C. proper.

Upon reaching our destination, we were very—lost, for lack of other words. A kindly man stopped us and gave us directions. I guess we really looked touristy. Uncertainly heading out to the National Art Gallery, we soon found it and wandered about inside for well over an hour. In the restaurant on the bottom floor, the girls and I each had Italian ice cream, or gelato. Peach was to-die-for! Exiting the Art Gallery on the end opposite of where we had entered, we journeyed on through a garden to the Natural Sciences Gallery and, after this, to the National Historical Gallery. I do not remember everything I saw; all I remember in detail was that my feet were killing me, and each building we entered into had a security check system to compete with the airports. I not only enjoyed the exhibits inside the buildings, but also the comfort and relief from the oppressive humidity.

Our party of eight met with Kayla's friends, the Schaeffers from Idaho, for dinner in the Reagan building. We had a blast. Melissa Rankin, Kayla, Jordan Schaeffer, and I split a ten-inch Sbarro's pizza; but we enjoyed socializing more than the pizza. My dad and Mr. Rankin then guided us out into the sweaty, sticky air to see Ford's Theatre and then hiked over to the Mall to take in the recently-established World War II Memorial. I also studied the wall at the Vietnam Memorial, not realizing how many men had perished in Vietnam. On the way back to the subway, we gazed in awe at the Lincoln Memorial after walking on the edge of the Reflection Pool at night. Incredible sight. By the end of the day, we had walked an estimated eleven miles round trip-from the subway and back.

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