Friday - Sunday

Day 7-
Sunday, September 30, 2007

Happy Sabbath! I love the Sabbath. It is such a day of renewal and rest. Another day to fill the soul.

Neal and I were able to get down to the metro in good time and were familiar with the Metro enough that we felt fairly confident in getting to church without incident, especially since I called the chapel yesterday and got a voice on the other end who was able to give me directions to the building. "You get off at the Frienshipheights station, go away from the construction, opposite Bloomingdale and up Western 1 block." That sounded easy enough! Well we surfaced from the Friendshipheights metro stop and couldn't find Western Avenue anywhere! So we started walking and still couldn't find it. We were standing in the middle of a block when a taxi had to stop because of a red light and I motioned for him to roll his window down and asked him where Western Avenue was. He said two blocks the other direction! So we were off again. Just as we approached Western Avenue, we hear the taxi driver who I had asked about Western Avenue next to us asking us where we wanted to go on Western and when I said, "the LDS church," he said, "I don't know where that is," and drove off. We think he was looking for a fare. True to the voice on the phone at the chapel, the building was 1 block away, one very long block away! But we made it before the opening song and prayer. It was a real pretty older chapel.

On our way up to church as we approached Western Avenue we noticed a second "Friendshipheights" metro station. We thought "what?" So on our way home from church we decided to take this closer metro station down to the train and see where it took us. When we got down to the train we noticed there was a sign saying "Jennifer Ave left - Western Ave right".
Quote for the day: "Each new Metro stop brings a new experience."


Day 6 -
Saturday, September 29, 2007

Apparently Friday completely wore the two of us out because we slept in till 7:30! Tomorrow we will definitely have to set an alarm. It took us a while to actually get going and out the door, but we soon were off to take in a session in the Washington DC temple! We felt more confident this morning finding our way around on Metro, but when we had to transfer to the bus, the attendant in the booth didn't understand us and we couldn't understand him, so we were on our own. We managed to find the right bus stop and were soon on our way. Neal was smart and thought to tell the bus driver the stop where we needed off. The driver actually missed our stop but we noticed it as we passed so the driver let is off in the middle of the block and there were no sidewalks so we were pretty much trudging through the weeds and dirt! I'm sure we looked pretty funny to the natives! But I kept telling myself that no one here knows me and they will never see me again! So on we trudged and we soon found the temple. It was so nice to be in the temple, to be in a familiar place albeit a strange building and to feel the peace that is within the walls of any temple! Ahhhhh, a most rejuvenating couple of hours! Soon it was time to leave the walls of safety and enter the chaos of life. But the walk back to the bus station was shorter and we soon found ourselves on our way back to Bethesda!

Back at our hotel we made a quick change into comfortable clothes and headed to Safeway to get some much needed personal items, something to eat Sunday after meetings, and some much craved fresh fruit! Then it was off to the zoo. Back to the metro. Interesting bit about the metro is that it runs underground for the most part which means you have to get under ground to catch the trains. So there is this LONG escalator that takes you down. It is quite impressive!

The Zoo was fun but we didn't see many animals. Here again, did Portland spoil me? We did get to see the Giant Panda's and that was Neal's whole purpose in going.

Upon returning home we ran downtown, got some Baja Fresh and Haagen-Dazs,and came back to eat in the hotel room so Shara could listen to the General Relief Society Broadcast. What a feast physically and spiritually!

We are finding the people here very friendly. Riding the bus from the temple we sat next to a real young family - mother, father and 5 month old baby. You know me, I can't sit next to a baby without saying hi! I talked Mom a bit and was surprised when she got off the bus before us and said good-bye. Then walking back from the zoo to catch our train we found the people friendly and soon found ourselves in a short conversation with another small family. Good to feel among friends!

Question for the day – “does a brown belt go with black pants?”

Day 5-
Friday, September 28, 2007

We checked out of our stinky hotel around 11:30 this morning, checked our bags in the front desk and caught a quick lunch at Vie de France, a cute little cafe right next to the hotel that is open only for lunch. We returned back to the hotel to get our bags and I about fell over when Neal actually tipped the bellhop. She was this sweet little ol’ African-American woman who looked like she should have someone waiting on her instead of the other way around. Then it was a quick ride to the Amtrak station. I’m beginning to think that I just must live in the most beautiful place on earth because here again I found the Richmond Amtrak station pale in comparison to the station in Salem.

We should have taken longer for lunch because we soon found ourselves with a 2-½ hour wait for our departure time. So we pulled out a couple of old Sudoku puzzles to do and soon found that our 2-½ hour wait quickly turned into a 4-½ hour wait! Once on the train it was such a gorgeous ride! And the ride was true to schedule and took only 2 hours! Oh, another shocker at the Amtrak station is Neal actually tipped our taxi driver! Oh my, twice in one day! Anyone who knows how Neal hates to tip will know what a wonder that was!!!

Upon arriving in Washington D.C., we found ourselves totally unprepared for the chaos of Union Station! We weren’t in Kansas anymore. You could lose yourself there in a heartbeat without even trying! But we found our way through the maze, got our luggage and made it to the metro line and survived. Well, almost. Remember the incident Shara had with her hotel key? Well, that same magnetic closure in her purse wiped out the magnetic strip on our metro passes! So we had to go to the gate and they had to write on our passes the date they would expire and so we now use either the “emergency” gate or the “free” gate. I just hope we don’t have any hassles the rest of the week.

Neal’s impression of the Amtrak depot as you just pull into Union Station is that of a Charles Dickens’s book, much like a dungeon. When he said that I immediately thought of “Oliver Twist”. It was kind of creepy down there. You half expected to see rats running all over, not an inviting place to be sure!

Riding the metro was our next nervous event of the day. We weren’t sure just how we were going to be able to manage our luggage and ourselves and make it on to the subway in one piece. Well, we did and the end of the line for us stops right at our hotel! Couldn’t ask for more than that!

And our hotel room is wonderful. We have a KING size bed! I think we need a ladder to get up into it though. After checking in to our room we walked a few blocks away and had a quick bite at The Austin Grill. It was an interesting walk to and from our restaurant. So many families among the partiers! The neighborhood had the feel of nightlife, but to see families with small kids gave it an interesting atmosphere. Neal said it felt like Disneyland with all the families.

Riding Amtrak!

View of DC from window of Amtrak!

Surfacing from the depths of the Amtrak sewer pit!

Union Station