Cherry Blossom Festival

 We went to the National Cherry Blossom Festival this week! We hit peak bloom and everything. Goal achieved.

  

We got there in the afternoon and went right to the Tidal Basin where all the trees are. We didn't do any of the festival activities, the trees are all we wanted to see.

I made fun of Todd for the artistic composition of this picture. Corners?

We took a hundred pictures that look just like this. The blooming trees were thick enough to form a ceiling overhead. They smelled so good!

About 1/4 of the way around, Todd's sandal strap snapped. It was 1.5 miles to the car or 1.5 miles to the Gap, so I set off to buy Todd some new flip-flops. The Gap had no mens sandals (what?) and there were no shoe stores within walking distance, so we improvised with some duct tape. His shoe held up for the rest of the walk around the basin and the walk to the car, amazing!

We parked at Gravelly Point Park and walked into the city. We'd totally do that walk again for free parking alone. But the top draw for this spot was that it's right across a tiny river inlet from the main runway at Reagan Airport. We watched planes take off on Wednesday and land on Thursday.

We did basically the same thing on Thursday as on Wednesday, but our friends the Teuschers joined us for day two. Before we left, we stopped by Arlington National Cemetery to find my grandparents' graves. It was quite the walk, but I think the parts of the cemetery that don't see all the tourists are the most beautiful anyway. Both of my Stanton grandparents died before I was born and I know almost nothing about them. But we learned from the headstone that my grandfather was a Senior Master Sergeant in the Air Force and a veteran of three wars. Impressive!

Not pictured: the Cafe Rio stops on the way up and the way back.