D.C. - Day 10 - U.S. Botanical Gardens

Today we planned to go to the Sackler gallery, Ripley International Gallery Center, and the U.S. Botanical garden, all on the Mall. The Ripley International Gallery had a special exhibit of Mexican artifacts, and the Sackler gallery had exhibits of asian art. They were both very disappointing. Most of the artifacts were contemporary art pieces (1990s+) with very little cohesive theme. The largest part of the mexican museum was a series of 5"x7" b&w photos that were hard to see and had no discernable theme. We didn't see very much of the asian art, but the few pieces we did see were also contemporary (2000s+) and rather boring.

So we jetted out of there and took a long walk down Independence Avenue towards the U.S. Botanical garden. The walk itself was long, but it has been a gorgeous day -- about 80 degrees with a good breeze. Perfect walking weather.

The U.S. Botanical Garden is a pretty small garden, as they go, but still very excellent. Outdoors was a water feature with places to sit and relax, rose garden, butterfly garden, various grasses, non-flowering plants, a very small aquatic garden and state-themed gardens (displaying plants from other state's botanical gardens). Indoors was a very large Conservatory. The conservatory was 3 floors in height and had carefully controlled climate zones so that in the "world deserts" garden it is hot and dry, while in the orchids section it is humid and shady. There was a "primeval" garden displaying plants that have survived for 150 million years, a jungle tropical rainforest, and a hawaiian habitat section. The east gallery displayed container plants and exhibits of various kinds of seeds. The west gallery displayed container plants and exhibits of how plants have been used in cooking and medicine. The orchid section contained 200 different species.

After we finished with the garden, we hopped onto the Metro and rode to Crystal City. It's been expanded since I last lived there some 15 years ago, and about 2/3 of the shops are new. But the mexican restaurant that I used to go to was still there and we had lunch there. I had a chimichanga and Dean had tamales. Very yummy. After lunch, we walked all around Crystal City peering into various specialty shops (there was an intriguing puppet shop with marionettes, hand puppets and finger puppets). After we walked the whole way and our feet were hurting, we walked back to the Metro and came back to the hotel to look at our pictures.

Now we're resting and we'll plan what we're going to do for dinner later. Today is our last full day here in D.C. Tomorrow morning is our flight home. It's been fun!