One of the DC heat-beating adventures we discovered last weekend was a water taxi from Alexandria to Georgetown.

To begin the afternoon, we took the metro to King Street, ambled the 1.5 miles to the waterfront past shops, cafes and restaurants, and then hung out at the pier for a while, enjoying the cool breeze and the abundance of shade.

From there, we had the sharp idea to head back to DC via boat, hoping it would be cooler on the water (it was, slightly) and that it might be fun to see the usual sites from the upper deck of a boat (understatement! It was nifty!)

The best part was that I had a sweet new 55-250mm telephoto zoom lens to try out, so I spent the ride alternating between photographing monuments and buildings on the shoreline (which I would never have been able to capture with my old 18-55mm lens) and shooting close-ups of the boats in the water around us (and the occasional commercial airliner), just because I could:


Can you guess what the following buildings are? (Hint: they're both in the District of Columbia, on the east bank of the Potomac. One of them is full of classified materials and the other once played host to a huge national scandal...)

I like to think of DC summers as one long adventure... a la Indiana Jones; the kind of adventure that sneaks up behind you and pulls out a machete. It inevitably seems like one minute, I'm walking to the nearest metro stop and the next, I'm outrunning mosquitoes the size of my eyeballs and calculating how much time I can spend in the sun before my internal organs start melting.

Nonetheless, I had friendly visitors from NH this past weekend, so - swampy summer heat or no - we thought we'd come up with something a little more adventurous than "staying alive and avoiding the outdoors at all costs". So on Friday, we headed over to the Newseum to check out all of the exhibits they've put together to illustrate the history of American news outlets, the impact of the first amendment, and the challenges journalists face in trying to cover news stories.

If you make it to Washington at any point, you should definitely take some time to check out the Newseum - the $20 tickets last for two consecutive days, so either come early or be prepared to go back. There are a couple of exhibits you won't want to rush through. Our favorites were the eight sections of the Berlin wall on the concourse level, the collection of Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs and the stories behind them, and the Ground Zero news coverage exhibit and film. There's also a whole interactive area on the 2nd level, where we'd probably have spent a lot more time, had we brought small children (ok, ok, I snuck in and played the "Wanna Be A Photojournalist?" game and then sort of wanted to try it again... fifty times or so).


In a city where most of the museums are free (< 3 the Smithsonian), the Newseum is a pricey day's entertainment, but we thought it was well worth it. It is, after all, the only museum of its kind in the world. And besides, isn't that what visits from parents and aunts are for? (Thanks, fellow partners in crime DC explorers!)