My Trip to (some of the) Smithsonian Museum
during my trip to DC!
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| Elephant at the Natural History Museum |
The main purpose of our
trip to DC was so that we could see some of the Smithsonian Museums. We saw 3: Natural
History, American History, and Air & Space. We probably would have seen
more except that we took 2 days to go to Manassas and Mount Vernon.
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| Easter Island Head |
Natural History Smithsonian Museum:
I suck
at museums. I love them a lot but I am a horrible museum goer. I spend 99% of
the time going around, ignoring signs and taking pictures of things that look
cool. That’s pretty much what I did at the Natural History Museum. The only
thing I knew about this is that it was the setting of the Night at the Museum movie so after I saw the Easter Island head I
went a bit stir crazy. So needless to say I didn’t learn much. I saw a lot of
stuffed animals and that was it. They did have an aquarium though and I found a
Dory near a Marlin so I imagined how those Finding
Nemo characters would have felt if they suddenly turned up in a museum
across the world. My favorite thing though was the Elephant in the Atrium. He
was just so big and cool.
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| Edith and Archie Bunker's chairs (All in the Family) |
American History Smithsonian Museum:
Even
though I still took a lot of pictures in this museum this is an experience I
remember better because I was so excited to be around the artifacts that I had
studied for as long as I could remember. Here’s a little back story: I had
never heard of the Smithsonians until I was watching that episode of Gilmore Girls when Rory is in DC for the
summer because she was elected class VP. In passing she said, “Well, I got to
see Archie Bunker’s chair at the Smithsonian Museum, so it was a big thumbs up
for me” and Jamie replies, “Yes, there are times when this country’s priorities
are exactly right.” I immediately knew two things: that I needed to see that
chair and that I needed to see what else this “Smithsonian” thing had if they
had cool stuff like the chair!
(If you don’t know who Archie Bunker is I am
very disappointed in you.) Once I did more research into it I realized that
Archie’s chair was in American History Smithsonian and that the majority of the
museum’s collection was not pop culture memorabilia, but very important
artifacts from our history.
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| Ruby's Ruby Slippers |
This
museum might be my favorite museum in the world BECAUSE of our priorities. This
museum honors everything from Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers from Wizard of Oz and Disney World rides to Lincoln’s Top Hat and the
famous “Teddy” Roosevelt bear! The museum represents American’s diverse, often
misplaced interests. They just had so much STUFF! I really cannot give you an
accurate description of even a percent of the coolest items but I am adding 6 photos of my very favorite ones.
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| Dumbo Disney ride! |
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| Lincoln's Hat! |
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| Greenough's Washington |
Air & Space Smithsonian Museum:
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| Famous Teddy Bear! |
Dad
was the one who really wanted to see this one. I could not have cared less
about it and yet the few cool things I found were SO COOL that it made the
whole experience worth it. I saw the Wright’s Brothers’ plane, vehicles that
went to the moon, and I touched a MOON ROCK. My favorite bit of this trip happened
in an empty display room with my dad. We were alone and looking up at some
plane or another and then when we looked down we were SURROUNDED by about 20 or
30 little kids all wearing bright yellow. They were in a single file line
holding hands. The chain of kids was turning around and the kid at the end
looked exasperated as he said, “WHAT?! We’re turning around AGAIN?! HOW BIG IS
THIS PLACE? I like planes as much as the next kid but this is too much!” I
connected with that kid. That museum was huge and seemed endless if you aren’t
a fan of planes, or space.
If you want to read more about my week long trip to the DC area, click here!
~Laura!
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