6/16/2013 2 Comments A Seriously Intense DayIt is always a bittersweet day at the end. We have had such a long and busy week, and many of us are missing home and ready to come home. We also know that there is so much more to see and do and we don't want to miss out on anything. This has been a much more relaxing day as well. We started the day at the National Law Enforcement Memorial. We added this to our schedule a couple of years ago because of a personal connection to the memorial for one of our staff members. We also have one student whose parent is in law enforcement and it seems appropriate for us to visit there. We laid some red carnations at the memorial this year, which we have not done before. From there we went to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. While this is a place that is always interesting, it is a very tough place to visit emotionally. As one student told me after the visit, "it is a sad place, but somewhere we had to come." Students are currently scattered between three museum locations - the US Botanic Gardens, the Air and Space Museum, and the Hirshorn Museum. Some highlights I hope the students find at the Air and Space Museum are the Wright Flyer, the Apollo and Mercury capsules, the lunar module, an aerogel sample, and I hope they touch the moon before they leave. At the Hirshorn Museum I will be interested to see what they find. Mrs. Spurgeon is guiding the tour through the modern art and is most likely having a blast over there! The Rainforest and tropical area at the US Botanic Gardens is always a highlight, as well as their orchids and the cacti. Groups have two hours in the museums this afternoon to see as much as possible, which is a definite challenge at the Air and Space Museum. One final stop and then it is back to the hotel to pack for the trip home tomorrow. We have breakfast at 6:30 am and will be on the road by 7 am local time. That is one hour earlier, so the hope is that we can be home a little early.
Overall, this has been an amazing trip. The students have received so many compliments on their behavior and dress that we are all very proud of them this week. Our nighttime chaperone has been so impressed with our students getting quiet and their behavior in the hotel each night. This has been a wonderful group of students to travel with and we have all had a great time showing them our nation's capital! It has been a great pleasure this year to be their guides. Before we head to dinner at Carmine's for spaghetti and salads, we want to send a shout out to
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6/15/2013 0 Comments History and ArtifactsWe started the day with a new activity - we had breakfast at the Hard Rock Cafe. They opened just for us this morning. From there we went to the Smithsonians. The students picked which museums on the north side of the mall they wanted to visit. Their choices were the American History Museum, the Natural History Museum, and the National Gallery of Art. They had about 1 1/2 hours to visit the museum, and all of them had great stories about the items they found and saw. We ate lunch at Ming's in Chinatown. It was family style serving - they brought 6 platters of food out and most of them said they found a dish they enjoyed. We went back to the museums for another hour. Many of them went back to the same museum, but some of them changed to see a new museum. We walked up to Ford's Theater, where we toured the museum before our ranger talk. In the museum the derringer gun that Booth used is there, as well as the pillow that President Lincoln's head was on when he died, the inside door to the presidential box, and the clothes that President Lincoln wore to Ford's Theater on April 14, 1865. After the ranger talk we ate dinner at Sizzling Express near the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Our last major activity of the evening was watching "Shear Madness" at the Kennedy Center. This is always a highlight of the trip! We came back to the hotel after the play so that students had some time to unwind and relax. Many of them got a chance to swim in the pool. They have had a couple of late nights so an early night back at the hotel was really needed. One of our student's had a birthday today and Hard Rock Cafe brought her an ice cream sundae at breakfast and we all sang her Happy Birthday. The ranger at Ford's Theater also said Happy Birthday to her at the start of his talk. We can't believe that tomorrow is the last day here.
6/14/2013 1 Comment George, Graves, and GhostsWow..... What a day! We started at Mount Vernon, George Washington's home. We toured the buildings on the ground, including touring his mansion, and then a quick visit through the museum. Some of us were able to find his dentures! We took the boat back to Washington DC. Despite the winds and being blown around on the upper deck, they really enjoyed taking the cruise back. Due to our dinner reservation we had a record trip through Arlington Cemetery. We made it up to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and saw the Changing of the Guard. After that there was a wreath laying by International Officers. There were military officers from Brazil, South Korea, Japan, India, Indonesia, and several other countries that laid the wreath, and that was very impressive to see. On the way up to the Tomb we saw one of the funerals in the cemetery today, with a full honor guard and band. On the way back to the bus we stopped and paid our respects to President Kennedy and his brothers. From this impressive and somber experience we went to dinner in Alexandria. We ate at an Irish restaurant called O'Connell's. Most students and chaperones enjoyed their fish and chips. We had an hour and a half before we had to gather for our ghost tour, so we had the opportunity to explore the riverfront. We saw street performers who played water glasses, the blues, a colonial piper, and drums. Several students had their portraits done by an artist. Then it was time for the ghost tour. The owner of the company is related to one of the teachers at RCMS and RCHS and he always takes one of our groups on the tour. We had four different groups and they all heard different ghost stories and saw new areas of the town. As a final surprise for the students Mrs. Berenda and Mrs. Kurdelak trekked all of the way to Georgetown after dinner to bring back Georgetown Cupcakes, from the TLC show DC Cupcakes. This was a huge hit!!!
6/13/2013 2 Comments Miles done and miles to go.....This has been a day of contrasts and changes. We knew that there were storms predicted for this morning and we wanted to make sure that we timed our tour on the National Mall correctly so that we were near a place to take shelter in case of strong storms. We started at the Korean War Memorial after waiting out the first couple of waves of rain. Then the rain left and despite a few drops here or there, the rest of the morning was dry. Students had a great morning visiting the Korean War Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. We laid red carnations at the Vietnam Wall in memory of Mrs. Zacher's uncle who died in Vietnam and the 4 men from Rensselaer who died in Vietnam. We also saw the Vietnam Women's Memorial which commemorates the nurse in Vietnam. We finished the morning at the World War II Memorial. For lunch we had Domino's Pizza deliver 20 pizzas to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial. They were delivered on a scooter and it was quite a site! We sat along the Tidal Basin to refuel and rest before our final walk around the Tidal Basin. The 8th graders then visited the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial, which is the newest one in town, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, the George Mason Memorial for the Founding Father who helped write the Bill of Rights, and the Thomas Jefferson Memorial. We have walked around 10,000 steps so far today!
After lunch the sun and humidity came out, and wow was it hot! It was a good thing that the majority of our walking was in the morning before lunch. We are currently sitting on the bus headed to Baltimore to see if we can get a baseball game in tonight! The clouds are starting to rebuild, but Mrs. Berenda says that the percent chance of rain for game time is actually low, so she said that will make her day! The game is at historic Camden Yard and the Baltimore Orioles are playing the Boston Red Sox tonight! The skies just opened up so the rain can pour down now. It's got three hours to clear out before first pitch! We have excited fans who want to see a game.... Say whatever thoughts you can send our way to clear these skies out for us!!! I'll try to up date tonight after we see the ball game ..... positive thought....positive thoughts! UPDATED! We stayed through the 11th inning last night - no rain and beautiful night at the ballpark. Camden Yard is a great place to see a game, but small for a major league park. One of our student's caught a ball last night! One of our student's also got an offer to trade his shirt with the Orioles center fielder, Adam Jones. It was just too late at the end of the 11th to stay any longer if we wanted to have students and chaperones who could get out of bed this morning. The Orioles won at the bottom of the 13th last night. 6/12/2013 2 Comments Pandas and PrintYesterday day was a whirlwind, and today was was humid and hot. The weather keeps changing by the hour, so we originally thought it was going to be in the low 80s and instead it was over 90 today. The day started with a tour of the National Zoo. The trip down the hill to visit the animals was great, until you had to make the trip back up the hill to get to the bus. We were there in the morning and the animals were more active. The orangutans were active on their O Line crossing the zoo which was fun to see, and of course the pandas were a highlight as always. Tian Tian was in the middle of breakfast when we showed up. From the zoo we headed to lunch at National Place. After fueling up, we hiked back up Capitol Hill to visit the Library of Congress and the Supreme Court buildings, which are across the street from the Capitol. There was a new exhibit at the Library of Congress about the Civil War, and in one of the display cases was the contents of President Lincoln's pockets the night that he was killed. There were glasses, a pocket knife, cards and several other items. We saw the Main Reading Room, which was used in the movie National Treasure. When we got in the Supreme Court we found out that a law clerk was retiring today and there was a special event, so we were unable to see the courtroom. We then visited the Newseum, which is a museum about journalism. There are multiple sections of the Berlin Wall and one of the guard towers from Checkpoint Charlie. There was a temporary exhibit on JFK and Jackie Kennedy which had rare photos and artifacts from his assassination and family candid moments. This was very interesting. We stopped by the White House to get some photos on the north side. After dinner we returned to the hotel for an earlier night since we have an early morning tomorrow. We know that there is a higher chance of rain and weather issues tomorrow, so we are working tonight on alternate plans just in case we need them.
6/11/2013 3 Comments Whirlwind First Day!What an amazing first day! This has been a very long day, but it was awesome! We started with breakfast at 8:00 at the hotel and then headed into the city. We walked up Capitol Hill and toured the US Capitol. We found out that starting next month scaffolding will be going up around the Capitol Dome because thousands of cracks have been found in the dome because of the earthquake two years ago. They are hoping that repairs will be done by the next presidential inauguration. Then we had a quick lunch at Union Station and it was on to the National Cathedral. The National Cathedral has many repairs going on as well from that earthquake. The small details and symbolism of items at the cathedral are always impressive. The fact that it is built out of Indiana limestone always amazes us!
We left North America for a visit to the Kenyan Embassy, so everyone can say we have visited Africa now. They ended up being very welcoming at the embassy. The students asked them great questions and learned a lot about Kenya. They took a group picture of us at the entrance that they are going to email to us, so we will post it when we receive it. Dinner was at a Tex-Mex restaurant called the Austin Grill. It was good food. Then we experienced something new that no one in the group had seen before. We had plans to go to the Iwo Jima Marine Corp Memorial and the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial tonight. We found out that on Tuesday nights in the summer the Marines have a parade at the memorial. The Commandant's Own Band, which plays for the President of the United States, performed several marching band pieces, and then the Marine Barracks Rifle Line performed their drills. At the end the President of the country of Palau laid a wreath at the memorial in honor of the Americans and people from Palau who gave their lives fighting to free Palau in World War II. On the way out of the event we met two Marines who talked to the students about their campaign medals and insignia and their 5 years of service to our country. A man came up in the rear of our group and starting asking who we were. It ended up being the father of one of the Marines who was talking to our group. He had never seen his son talk to a group of students like that and was very impressed with our students. The last stop tonight was at the 9/11 Pentagon memorial, which is always a moving experience. It was a much later night than planned, so tomorrow night will be an early night. Our USA Today reporter that we were going to meet with had to fly to Colorado for a story so we had to cancel that event. We will instead plan on a stop for photos at the White House and an early night back at the hotel. We have received numerous compliments throughout the day today from people we have interacted with and people we have just met walking around about our students' dress and their behavior today. One of our favorite quotes today is, "Will our phones be roaming while we are in Kenya." 6/10/2013 1 Comment On the RoadWe are off and rolling. We met at school at 6:30 this morning to head to DC! The students helped get all of the luggage loaded and on the bus. There has been some rain on the trip, especially outside of Columbus when we pulled in for lunch. Many of us made a mad dash for 5 Guys in the rain. Great lunch but we were all wet. We are currently in West Virginia outside of Morgantown, nearly to Maryland. We have slept some, talked and laughed, and enjoyed some movies, especially the new Lincoln movie. Dinner will be in a couple of hours at Golden Corral and then on to our hotel. We are staying in McLean, Virginia, about 20 minutes outside of DC. Tomorrow will be our first full day, and it will prove to be a busy day. We will be headed to the US Capitol, the National Cathedral, the Kenyan Embassy and a night tour of the 9/11 Pentagon Memorial as well as the Marine Corp Iwo Jima memorial. We haven't taken too many pictures today on the bus. Tonight we'll see if we can collect a few to post. 6/7/2013 0 Comments Are you ready to go?Monday is the big day! I know I am spending the weekend organizing and packing my suitcase.... actually I have packed and repacked and repacked again. I keep changing my mind about what I want to take to DC. The weather is scheduled to be in the low to mid 80s and a chance of rain most of the week, so make sure you pack an umbrella or a raincoat! See you all bright and early at school on Monday at 6:30
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