Day 2, Fri: Touring Washington, D.C. by bicycle - 12 miles

We started out our day touring the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.  Their mission is to securely and efficiently produce United States currency and other government securities that satisfy the current and future needs of the American public and the government agencies which serve them.

Ever wonder what a million dollars in cash would look like?

 

A folding tester from the 1920s is pictured above.  It was designed to test the endurance of paper by repeated folding.  United States currency notes can be folded back and forth on the same crease about 4,000 times before tearing.

If you happen to have a $4,000 bill or a $100,000 bill lying around, it is worth three times that amount today.

From there we bicycled to the Capitol Building for a tour and it definitely is on a hill.

The Capitol rotunda.



The American Statue of Freedom.  This same statue is also on top of the Capitol dome.






We did not realize that the Capitol complex is this long and this big.

 

This afternoon we visited the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.  We did not realize how long it is.  The wall begins by the small sign on the ground by the bottom left of this picture.  It goes straight, then turns right and goes to the edge of this picture on the right. 

From there we went to the Einstein Memorial.  We will come home smarter since we rubbed Albert's nose. 


The finale to our day was a visit from our great-niece, Hadley, and her parents, who drove down from Crofton, MD to have dinner with us.

It's never too early to start encouraging interest in cross-country bicycling.