Last week, I went down to NYC on Wednesday for HC meetings Wednesday and Thursday in the city, and then on Friday my best friend Jackie (who lives in NYC) and I took the bus to Washington, DC for the weekend!
Jackie had never been to DC before. I had been there three times before- this past February when Windsor, Annie and I got to meet Lady Gaga, last summer to visit my college roommate Becca, and once when I was younger with my family- but I still felt like I didn’t know the city well.
So Jackie and I got TONS of recommendations from friends who live(d) in DC for all the best places to go, and then we planned out what in our opinion was an absolutely amazing, delicious, sight-packed, super fun 48-hour trip! If you are headed to DC any time soon, definitely keep all of this in mind!
We arrived in DC Friday afternoon (starving, because the bus didn’t get there until 3pm and we didn’t have any food with us), and had lunch at Kramerbooks, a cute cafe attached to a bookstore in Dupont Circle. I tweeted the fact that we were there, and a friend of mine who used to live in DC saw my tweet and tweeted back at me that we should try an ice cream place (Larry’s) that was right near there, so we headed there after lunch (yay Twitter!). I got mocha chip and Jackie got oatmeal cookie dough ice cream. Then we went back to our hotel (the Dupont Circle Hotel) to shower and change.
That night, we went to a super happening Mexican restaurant in Dupont Circle called Lauriol Plaza that had been recommended to us many times over. They said it would be an hour wait, but we got seated in 15 minutes! We split nachos and cheese and veggie quesadillas.
We took these pics while waiting to be seated at Lauriol Plaza. They had Obama cardboard figures so we had to pose with them!
That night we went bar-hopping to James Hoban’s in Dupont Circle, then Public Bar in Dupont Circle, and then made our way to Adams Morgan (another part of DC) where we met up with some of Jackie’s friends from Cornell.
Here we are out on Friday night! I got this dress (by Bailey’s) last week on clearance at Bloomingdale’s, and thought it was perfect for DC! It reminds me a lot of this dress of Windsor’s.
Saturday we had brunch at Circa at Dupont, where Jackie got an egg white omelette with veggies and I got cornflake-crusted banana-stuffed french toast- yum!
Then we headed out (via the Metro) for a day of sightseeing. We started at The Capitol and made our way around from there to the Lincoln Memorial, Washington Memorial, WWII Memorial, Botanical Garden, Vietnam Memorial, Library of Congress, White House, Treasury… I am probably forgetting some. It was super hot and sunny but that was fine with us!
Here are a bunch of our “tourist” pics!
To take a break from walking, we went to the rooftop bar at the W Hotel (another recommendation from a friend), which has one of the best views in all of DC. You can see right onto the top of the White House where the Secret Service agents are stationed!
Then we were hungry, so we went to a nearby outdoor restaurant (I forget the name) and got a crab and artichoke dip that was also great.
Then we headed back to our hotel. Saturday night we headed to Georgetown area, where we ate dinner outdoors at Sequoia right on the waterfront, which was beautiful. We got calamari for an appetizer, then split lobster ravioli and a Caesar salad. For dessert we split something called a Snickers bar, which was a chocolate/peanut butter/caramel thing, which was not as good as the main meal.
Here we are at Sequoia (yes, I wore the white dress for a second night!).
Then we went to Nick’s Riverside Grill, a bar on the Georgetown waterfront, then to a bunch of bars in Georgetown on M Street and Wisconsin Ave.: Third Edition, Daily Grill, Paolos. Main takeaway: style in DC is very, very preppy!!! We were pretty exhausted from our day of sight-seeing in the hot sun so we did not stay out too late and opted to get a good night sleep.
Sunday we went back to Georgetown for brunch and shopping. At brunch we split french toast with caramel sauce and a scrambled egg/potato/bacon thing, which also came with fruit salad and a biscuit. They also brought cornbread for the table.
After walking around the stores, we took HC writer Katie Sanders‘s recommendation and went to Baked & Wired Cupcakes, rather than the famous Georgetown Cupcakes (which has its own TV show- DC Cupcakes). I got a red velvet cupcake and Jackie got a vanilla cupcake. Definitely recommend it!
Then we went back to out hotel, Jackie went to the bus station to take a bus back to NYC, and I went to the airpirt to fly back to Boston! All in all a fantastic trip!!!