My First Tour

I prepared: I drove the route I planned three times -- Sunday, Monday night (to get a sense of traffic), and Tuesday morning. I took notes, read more background information, and took the Old Town Trolley Tour Monday. I learned a lot on the Trolley Tour and added to my note cards. Although I wasn't totally confident, I felt that I could handle a three-hour tour for three persons -- grandmother, grandfather, and student on a college tour. I also considered the tour great preparation for my test on April 27th and felt that the experience was more in line with showing my friends and family around town than leading a tour.

Imagine my first surprise when the student, rather than the sophomore or junior I expected, turned out to be a 7th grader! This was his Bar Mitzvah present; I don't know many seventh graders interested in touring colleges. The tour started out well. I picked up the family unit at National Airport where they had dropped off their rental car after a tour of UVA, and we headed to the district. With all of my practice, I was actually able to get around, not an easy thing, especially with my poor sense of direction. It is not a rumor that L'Enfant designed the city in a way to confuse invading armies, including the scores of tourists here for spring break and the cherry blossoms. I had my GPS for back-up.

We went up 14th Street and headed immediately to 10th Street to see Ford's Theater. We were able to stop for a picture before continuing our tour. We did a circle of the Supreme Court, Library of Congress, and around the Capitol with a picture stop as well. I thought that the family might appreciate some water and snacks, so I had stopped and picked some things which turned out to be a good idea. It was hot (90 degrees in DC in April!), and everyone wanted water; Grandpa enjoyed the cheese crackers and grandson had an apple. What surprised me was that none of them seemed to appreciate this gesture; at least, I never heard a thank you.

From the Capitol we made our way to Raoul Wallenberg Place and to the memorials. Grandpa had some difficulty walking and brought along his handicapped sticker which turned out to be very helpful. Parking around the FDR memorial has been removed in preparation of the new Martin Luther King Memorial, but they kept a small area for handicapped parking. We were able to do a full tour of the FDR memorial, one of my favorites and one close to my heart since this was the last place I visited with my mom who passed away a number of years ago. We were also able to stop at the Lincoln and take time to see the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial as well as the Korean Memorial; it was difficult for the grandfather to walk around, so he waited in the car while Grandma and grandson visited.

From there the tour went downhill. I knew from my previous driving runs that I had to turn around to 17th in order to drive into the handicapped parking. What I forgot is that you cannot make the left from Constitution during rush hour. Grandpa said to forget it and just go to the White House, which his grandson wanted to see. There is no place to park at the White House, so I dropped them off at the corner by Decatur House and told them I would be right back after a trip around the corner. Big mistake! Rush hour was particularly bad this evening (I found out later that it took my friend who works in DC two and a half hours to get to Tyson's Corner, more than double the usual rush.) and it took me about 35 minutes to go around the corner. Grandma was not a happy camper. "Why didn't I go the other way around the block? Did I know that traffic was better the other direction? Maybe I should know.

By now they were concerned about getting to the airport. Ironically, although I am usually very anxious about getting to an airport on time, I was somehow confident we would be fine. I promised them to be there at 7:30, and I was determined that I could do that. It was 6:50 when I finally was able to pick them up at the corner on 17th, and we found ourselves in the same traffic mess. I tried to keep up the conversation because I knew everyone was on edge. As we cleared 14th Street and I could see an open road in front of me at 7:25, I knew that we would make it. Drop off at the airport exactly on time, bags taken out of the car, good start, bad end: no tip.

The first tour was certainly a learning experience.