The Vacation - Part 3 New York City and Cooperstown

New York City skyline

We had an interesting tour of Ellis Island.  We got to walk through the process that arriving immigrants went through and hear some of their stories.  

The main hall

We also took a tour of the Statue of Liberty.  We got to learn all about the conception, planning and building of the statue.

Life size replica of the torch inside the visitors center in the base of the statute.

Actual size of Lady Liberty's feet.  At this point I am holding Josh's head phones because he is DONE GOING ON TOURS!!  (Which also accounts for the sweet expression on his face.  Poor Josh!)

View of the Brooklyn Bridge from the top

Waiting for the ferry

Julia's sweet crown

On the ferry back

The Chrysler Building

(for all you Percy Jackson fans)

Now on to Cooperstown, home of the Baseball Hall of Fame.  Finally something Josh is excited about!  All through the trip the other two were picking out T-shirts and souvenirs, but Josh wasn't really interested in any of that until we got to Cooperstown.  While we were there he got hats, shirts, baseball cards, player plaques, framed pictures, figurines, and the list goes on.

We took over 200 pictures at the Hall of Fame.

Julia loves the Yankee's for some reason

Babe Ruth

The first inductees: Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, Walter Perry Johnson and Babe Ruth

Supersized "Ted Williams Special" made from a telephone pole

Babe Ruth

Jackie Robinson

Zach loves the A's

Graphic of No-Hitters pitched

No-No's and Perfecto's

Josh and his main man, Dodger Manny Ramirez

Two other items to note, while in Cooperstown we also saw the Soccer Hall of Fame (which is closed down) and the Doll House Hall of Fame.

The side of the building looked like it had a giant soccer ball crashing out

The Doll House Hall of Fame had about 100 doll houses and miniature scenes.  While there Julia convinced her dad that we needed to get one to put together ourselves.

Julia's house is this style.  She is planning to paint it pink.  Of course.

The Vacation - Part 2 - Gettysburg, Amish country and Valley Forge

Next up on the trip was a visit to Gettysburg.  We drove by some of the battlefields, but I was too busy staring to remember to take any pictures.  These pictures were taken at the museum.

It was really neat to see all this after the kids had just read the Gettysburg Address on the wall at the Lincoln Memorial a few days before.

Our next stop was Amish Country in the beautiful Pennsylvania Dutch Country.   Steve loved all the rolling green of the farmland.  The kids loved looking for farms with the laundry hanging out to dry.  We went to a fun marketplace and saw lots of Amish crafts, fed some animals, and got to try all kinds of butters, jams, sauces, salsas and pickles.

Julia's favorite thing in Lancaster was the Doll Outlet.

Our next stop was Valley Forge.

Josh and George

George Washington's house

Inside the kitchen

The Vacation - Part 1 - Washington DC

We had an amazing time on our trip.  We had a very full two weeks and we saw so much.  We saw old friends, monuments, history, natural wonders, beautiful landscapes and so much more!  Anyway, here just a sampling of the well over a thousand pictures that we took.

We flew from SFO to Dulles the day after school got out.  The kids were excited to get to DC and we were so happy to be able see our friends the Warners.  They were kind enough to let us stay a few days with them and joined us on some of our adventures around DC.  The first day in DC we went to the American History Museum.  One of the highlights there was the giant flag that inspired the Star Spangled Banner.  Of course there is no flash photography of the flag, but Julia took this picture of the flag replica made out of metal in front of the entrance to the exhibit.

Julia, Sammy, Josh, Zach and Jon

View from the cafeteria

Julia Child's kitchen

Next up was the Museum of Natural History.  The kids loved all the animals, but the giant squid was not quite what I was expecting.  We also saw the Hope Diamond and got to touch a rock from Mars.

The next day we started off at the National Archives.  There we saw the originals of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.  It is amazing to see all the measures that have been taken to preserve these documents.

Next up was the Air and Space Museum.  Julia's 5th grade teacher was really into space and so Julia had done several space related projects during the year so that was exciting for her to see some of the things she had studied.  We also saw an interesting IMAX movie about the Hubble telescope.

That evening we went to all the monuments.  First we walked down to the Washington Monument.  This is right about where my camera died, so these photos are all courtesy of Steve's iPhone.

Cooling off at the World War II Memorial

View of the Washington Monument from the Lincoln Memorial

Lincoln

Vietnam Memorial

Jefferson Memorial

(All the ones taken on the inside were too dark - no flash on the iPhone 3 and the new iPhone 4 came out too late to help us out here)

FDR Memorial

The next day we had a tour of the Capitol building.  We started out in the brand new Visitor's Center which was pretty cool and has a full size replica of Freedom, the statue that is on top of the Capitol.

 

The tour was really interesting

Looking up at the incredible inside of the dome.

After the tour we went to the Library of Congress.  They have a big section on Thomas Jefferson that includes several rough draft copies of the Declaration of Independence.  It also includes what remains of his personal library that he donated to Congress after their books were burned in a fire. 

Julia loved all of this and even got a shirt with a famous quote of his: "I cannot live without books." 

Then on to the Supreme Court building

and the White House

Then we headed back to the Warner's for a fun evening out of pizza and Italian ice.  Rita's was delicious!

Our last day in DC we went to the Udvar-Hazy Air and Space Museum. 

Stealth plane

Space Shuttle Enterprise