DC: Arlington

The part of the week that Dave was most looking forward to was a trip to Arlington National Cemetery.  Here we splurged and saved ourselves more walking in the heat and took the tram tour.  This was wonderful!  It drove us around the entire cemetery in a breezy, open-air tram, with narration of some of the stories of those buried here.  The tram let us out at important places, like the tomb of the Unknown Soldier.  On this day, there were actually 10 real funerals going on, so the tram did not make stops at a few places like the Iwo Jima (Marine Corps) Memorial.  

    

This day also had the best clouds. :)

We had all the feelings on this trip!  At a hallowed place, like the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, where the ceremony is so precise and revered, you can't help but feel all the pride and patriotism, all the gratitude for those who made the ultimate sacrifice and for their families who live in the heart wrenching unknown.  

The Amphitheatre.

A view of the whole city from Robert E. Lee's house on the hill.

This day ended with a dinner we were pretty excited for!  After hearing rave reviews, I made us a reservation for Sfoglina-- a pasta place with a famous chef.  We had the 3 pasta family sampler with a side of Nonna Palmina’s Meatballs and we devoured it!  For all the foodies out there, this is Fettuccine Alfredo from Rome, Gnocchi with shiitake mushrooms, porcini crema and grana Padano from Le Marche, and Mafalde Telefono with smoked mozzarella, tomato, and basil from the Amalfi Coast (the most delicious thing I ate all week!). I haven't spent much time talking about our food, but we ate well!  We tried to find unique DC places, causal or fancy.  Some nights it was ramen and Brussel sprouts tempura, or a cheese-stuffed mushroom burger for beef-averse Ella and a birthday cake milkshake for sugar-lover Delia from Shake Shack (the East Coast's In & Out) and some nights it was pasta we had to google the pronunciation for! :) Ella is an adventurous eater and said great food was one of her best surprises on this trip.