First stop -CVS. We'd been advised not to park at the nearest Metro station because it usually has no available parking after about 8 am. I'd gone onto google maps and printed out directions to the White Flint Station, in Bethesda, MD. However, that station only accepts something called a Smart Trip card - which is an RFID card you can use to pay for parking and fares. The parking structure only accepts that. Naturally, you can't buy the cards at most stations - that would make too much sense. So the CVS stop to buy the card was required.
The fun started after that. We hit unexpected traffic due to construction lane closures. That pretty much killed our extra time. We could still make it if we didn't any other traffic.
However, we didn't bring want to bring our GPS (we have enough stuff) so instead I printed out Google directions. They got us slightly lost the night before, but ever optimistic I was reassured by the hotel clear's assessment that it really was because of construction and all internet directions were wrong.
We made it to Maryland just fine. The fun started when we left the freeway. We made the first couple of turns correctly, but then couldn't find the street that the GPS recommended. We figured we'd missed it, so went in the right general direction. After driving a while, we found the Rockville Pike or something. Yay - the Metro station is on that. We figured we'd overshot our street, so we turned right. Apparently, the street was further than we thought, and so turning right didn't immediately find it. We did, however pass the same interstate we got off of. Then - yay - a Metro sign. No yay - it was the station inside the NIH - and they probably didn't want us parking there. We continued on. Eventually, we wound up in Bethesda, south of the station we needed. At that point, we stopped in a gas station and they told us to back the way we came - 2 miles. At that point it was very clear we were going to be late. I called the Congressman's office and the staffer who answered looked up the location for us. We did eventually find it, and made it to our tour almost an hour late.
Fortunately, January is not the busy time at the Capital, so Vince, the staffer who arranged this for me was still able to take us. He also brought along their new intern. We did want to say hello to the Congressman but Congress was out for the week so he was home in CA. I'll have to catch him next time he has a fundraising party at my moms. The tour was interesting - a private tour may not cover much more than the public tour, but you do have a great opportunity to ask any question you want. We learned how congress members evaluate bills so they can vote intelligently and about who sits where for joint sessions. We also got to sit in the Gallery for the House of Representatives, which may not be available on the public tour. The tour took about 2 hours. Afterwords we stopped by the office our Congresswoman - Anna Eschoo, but she too is in CA.
Before leaving our tour, we'd asked Vince to recommend some restaurants in walking distance. He pointed out a couple on Pennsylvania Ave (and suggested we avoid the Burrito place - he's also from the Bay Area). One of the places he recommended was Good Eats, a burger place. We decided it might be a while before we could get a good burger (before you all jump down my throat I sad good burger, not good beef!) so we went there. The restaurant had a copy of the Top Chep cookbook displayed. Then I noticed the menu had things like "Spike's Rosemany/Thyme Fries" (outstanding btw). Click! I've heard of this restaurant - Spike, a chef from a previous season of Top Chef is the owner/chef and that's where I'd seen it.
The burgers were also great and the milkshakes were good - and interesting. Glen's was a milky way shake - chocolate caramel and something else swirled - what flavor you got depended where you put the straw. I opted for toasted marshmallow- the shake had marshmallow bits floating in it. I hope to eat there again.
It was 4pm by this time, and so we decided to head back to the car and to the airport. It was a bit earlier than necessary, but the delay of the tour really made it too late to do a second thing.
An interesting thing happened on the way out of the metro station. Remember that Smart Trip card? CVS only had 10.00 cards. Because of the time of day, I figured I'd need to add money to it to cover both my fare and the parking. We didn't have time going in, so I figured I'd do it going out. However, there was nowhere before exiting to add money. I asked the agent, and he swiped the card, told me there wasn't enough on it to pay the fare. I was confused about that, because there should have been enough, and I learned that on the 10.00 card I bought, 5 of it was a charge for the card. I asked how I'd get out. He said swipe it, it will let you out but you'll have a negative balance. That worked, but here's my question. All I did was buy the card with cash. They have no idea who I am. I did have to bring it back up because I needed it for parking, but if not, how would they know? Strange. Oh well, getting out of the parking lot was easy.
We gassed up the car, and headed to the airport, since there wasn't really enough time to do anything else. We arrived with 4 hours before our flight. Thanks to an airport employee who know a store worker with a box cutter, I was able to get some suitcase locks opened (I've heard stories of things being stolen out of outside suitcase pockets, etc) and we headed to the Red Carpet to wait it out. We spent a bit of time with another one of our online cruise friends who were on our flight and I made some final farewell calls to my family (I will stay in touch via the web) and we headed to the plane.
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