I’m a girl who’s passionate about the government and politics. That’s why heading to D.C. for a few days this week seemed like a fantastic idea. I headed down early Wednesday morning with my cousin and a mutual friend. My cousin told us she had a surprise for us and when we were a little ways outside of D.C., she revealed that the surprise was tickets to tour the Capitol! I’d toured the Capitol once before when I was in high school and took a trip with my class to D.C.
The Capitol is a stunning building, with incredible architecture all throughout it. The official first architect is William Thornton, who created the design for the Capitol building. Though the average tour is incredibly short, it’s still a great time. You enter freedom hall, get your tickets, and then join a tour group. They take you around on the lower level of the Capitol and you see a room with tons of pillars that sits atop a crypt. That crypt was meant for George Washington, but he (and his family) refused to be buried there. Since then, the tomb has remained empty and always will.
After the lower level, the guide leads you upstairs to the rotunda, which is filled with beautiful artwork, in addition to the architecture. There are huge paintings that mark important events of the United States’ history, along with a frieze that goes around the top of the interior of the rotunda. Each state gets to place two statues of influential people from their state in the Capitol and many are located in the Rotunda. Once this portion of the tour is over, you’ll move into Statuary Hall, which is where House of Representative meetings were originally held. The room is gorgeous, made of marble and sandstone. There are many statues in this hall as well and it’s shape allows a person to stand in one spot and speak at a normal volume while others across the hall can hear him.
The tour takes you to a few more rooms, but then you’re free to head back outside and take pictures of the outside of the Capitol. Once our tour was over, we walked around and got some breathtaking photos of the Capitol. I think the building has great dignity and the beautiful weather made it even more powerful. Capitol Hill is the seat of our government and where the major laws of the country are created and decided upon.
After our visit to the Capitol, we ate lunch at Bullfeathers, an insider place that lobbyists take members of Capitol Hill for lunch (I highly recommend the milkshakes). The restaurant got its name because “bullfeathers” is a phrase that Teddy Roosevelt used to say instead of cursing. D.C. has many hidden gems such as this place to eat. Wandering around the city is something that will never get old.
Since it was such a beautiful day, we took the time to see a few more landmarks: a walk past the White House, the Jefferson Memorial, the FDR Memorial, and a walk along the Potomac. We headed to National Harbor for CPAC and ended our day in D.C. But I’ll definitely be going back soon.