d.c.: day 2

We told ourselves that we would take it easy today, not rush around trying to do everything but relax and go with the flow. We ended up walking around A LOT, and doing much more than anticipated, even though we just wandered in and out of buildings as we saw them.

So we got up pretty late, missed our b&b's breakfast, and headed out around 11 a.m. First stop was Cake Love, which is a bakery two blocks down the street. I thought it was only okay; Love at First Bite in Berkeley is much better (and costs less too).


Our goal was to walk around the Capitol Building area, so we took the metro to Union Station:

As we were walking towards the Capitol Building, we noticed the Senate Offices next to us, and decided to go inside. We found out that we could visit the offices of our "members of Congress" (i.e. our senators) and so we did!

This is one of the underground tunnels connectimg the three Senate office buildings with each other and the Capitol Building. We saw lots of people whom we suspected could be important political people :)

lobby of the Hart Building, where the CA senators' offices are located

We didn't see our senators at their offices, but Senator Boxer's staff did give us gallery passes so that we could see the House of Representatives and the Senate chambers. As we continued to make our way to the Capitol Building, we stopped by the Supreme Court:

this is the actual chamber where the justices hear cases

We finally made our way into the Capitol Building, where we were able to bypass the long lines and see the Senate and House in session.

staircases on the way up to the Senate Gallery

The coolest thing is that we actually saw two senators: our own senator, Dianne Feinstein, was giving a report, and Senator Arlen Specter (PA) was sitting there too. There weren't many other people around, but we sat for awhile and listened to Senator Feinstein talk about a very current political scandal.

Afterwards, we headed to the Library of Congress, my favorite part of today. It was such a lovely and magnificent building. We took a free tour, which explained many of the architectural details inside.
Now, up until this point, we hadn't really eaten all day (I had my two cupcakes from Cake Love, but Byron hadn't eaten anything except an apple someone gave him while we waited in line to get into the Capitol Building), and it was already almost 5 p.m. We were tired and pretty cranky, and there was nothing around--no restaurants or vendors! We didn't know what to do, we just kept walking along the Mall (downtown area where most of the museums and monuments are), until we saw a little food stand near the National Archives. We both literally ran there, ordered hot dogs, and ate them in two minutes flat.

We then checked out the National Archives and looked at the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Pretty cool stuff. Finally, after stopping by H&M in downtown (heehee), we headed home, where right across the street from our metro station was the famous Ben's Chili Bowl:

I got chili cheese fries with jalapenos on top, and they totally reminded me of high school, where Pauline and I literally ate this every single day! Yum. Now, both Byron's and my calves are sore from all of that walking. Tomorrow is supposed to be another "leisurely" day...