8/9/22 I went to the mall

Another day down, another 15,000+ steps! This is definitely one of those times where I’ll need a holiday from my holiday.

Today was all about the Washington DC monuments around the West half of the National Mall, first stopping at the Jefferson Memorial. It was pretty cool walking around it and then suddenly the big man is looking out at you. Mostly you have to walk around it because the beginning of September seems to be when they do all their maintenance and upgrades. So many things on this trip have been undergoing work, I guess after the summer crowds now is the time to get work done.

My brain / eyes seem to be slightly off, so many of my photos are tilted just a little bit.

A dark mysterious figure…

They do know how to make a fantastic memorial - so much detail everywhere.

And so many Spanish speaking jackasses making a hooer of a noise, talking on their phones with the speaker on, having family squabbles at the top of their voice. Not sure if they are from Spain or from South America but they can all. Fuck. Right. Off.

Just after I left here three bus loads of them emptied to go visit, I can only imagine the racket.

Some of the loonies here, including most of the Supreme Court could do well to read this

The President’s Helicopter. Not sure if he was in it, didn’t seem to be much on his schedule today that involved going anywhere. Maybe they were taking it to get the ashtrays emptied.

Despite the urge to go running through the water shouting Jenny! I restrained myself, mainly because the water is pretty manky and full of duck shit.

Another grand memorial

Green and trees everywhere!

Just after this guy tried to catch the squirrel. Was hoping to capture it savaging him but no luck.

Dad’s name twin, not likely to have met since he died in the Vietnam War.

The WWII memorial. The actually mentioned in passing the contribution of other countries towards the effort which was unusual. Apparently not much happened prior to December 1941 anyway.

Dipping your feet in the water is allowed, but wading is not. I didn’t fancy putting my feet into that suspicious looking soup.

Our neck of the woods.

Despite looking completely flat the Mall is quite uneven and has a few raised parts to it. I think it’s so big and long it sort of just evens out.

Obligatory selfie.

The local brickwork ran out so they had to change suppliers half way up.

So by almost 5pm I was a little hungry - this was the first thing I’d eaten today. There were kiosks dotted around the Mall but I didn’t fancy a tuna sandwich or hot dog that had been stewing in there all day.

I finally tried the nuggets at Chick-fil-A. They were fine. Then I had them with the sauce. Oh My God.

I can never have any other nugget without the sauce again. It is a mix of BBQ, Ranch and Honey Mustard, and you can get it in bottles! There goes one suitcase filled up.

It’s no Popeyes chicken sandwich, that’s for sure.

Very good waffle fries - even better with the sauce. The lemonade though - made with real lemons!

Chick-fil-A is now my favourite for lemonade and sauce.

Tomorrow I’m on to my last leg of the trip - New York! I’m so excited I get to go back. I’m taking a three hour train there, and first up tomorrow night is the Billy Joel concert at Madison Square Garden. I can still remember hearing about his concerts there when Sarah and I went on a tour and saying how amazing it would be to go - and now it’s tomorrow.