Museum of Natural History

All that we got done today was the Museum of Natural History, another huge museum. We got an earlier start because we knew what we were doing with the Metro. We had thought that we would be here before all of the summer school kids hit DC but we were wrong. Evidently we are right in the middle of the "field trip" bunches from the nearby schools. But that's all right, it just makes me thankful that I'm not an 8th grade teacher !

The museum is right next door to the Sculpture Garden from yesterday so we didn't have to walk very far from the train stop. Our brains are exhausted as well as my feet by the time we got thru the whole thing. We looked at ancient and modern creatures of the oceans. Animals from Africa and the US (elephants, lions, moose, fox etc etc). The exhibits are set up so neat so that the animals are all doing natural things instead of just standing there. Then we saw dinosaurs and huge diamonds, emeralds, crystals and the Hope diamond. We learned about earthquakes and volcanoes. We saw plants, insects, frogs and snakes. It was entirely overwhelming. I found that I didn't take an awful lot of pictures because I couldn't decide what to take a picture of and you couldn't take a picture of everthing.

It is nice coming back to the park after a hectic day surrounded by all of the tourists. We are b-queing hot dogs tonight over a campfire (we had hamburgers last night). We ate a picnic lunch today just outside the museum on a stone wall (we were too lazy to walk around to the Mall side). Tomorrow, I guess that we will try the Air & Space Museum hoping that perhaps there won't be as many kids on a Saturday.