D.C. Itinerary
 

Hey all,

Giving y'all a very rough outline for a 3 day D.C. itinerary. Input and/or suggestions would be welcome because I know my times and hours visited might be off here and there.

Sunday

Arlington National Cemetery – 5:30 p.m.- 7 p.m.

View All Monuments at Night after 7 p.m.

Monday

Bureau of Engraving and Printing – 9 a.m. - ?

White House Visit – 10:30 a.m. – 11 a.m.

Ben’s Chili Bowl – Lunch

Holocaust Museum – 1 p.m. – 4 p.m.

Museum of American History – 5 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.

Dinner

Tuesday

Crime Museum – 9 a.m.- 11 a.m.

Ford's Theatre – 11:30 a.m. (Hour)

Lunch

Newseum – 1 p.m. – 4 p.m.

National Archives – 4:30 p.m. – Whenever

Dinner

Wednesday

Capitol Tour – 9 a.m.

Supreme Court and Library of Congress Walk-Around till Lunch

Lunch

Air and Space Museum 12 p.m.- 2-3 p.m.

Natural History Museum 2-3 p.m.- 5 p.m.

You are cutting most of the museums way too short. The Newseum could take all day.

IMO, this is doable, although there is a lot of time on your feet. The thing about museums is, yes, sure, you could take a day or days in some of them, but if you want a taste of several and your time is not unlimited (whose is?), you have to foreshorten. If you find yourself more interested than you expected to be in any one of them, you can rejigger the schedule as you go to give you more or less time at some of them.

I would say that it's impossible to "view all monuments"--they keep building new ones, for one thing! I would list the ones you feel are essential for you, look at a map, and plot your walking accordingly. Some you will be able to just swing past as you go.

I was just going to reply to my post to state that this would be possible as long as you are flexible and would be willing to stay longer at some, rather than just running between them with a checklist of sites to see.

Agree about the Newseum in particular - we spent 6 hours (over 2 days) and could have spent more!

And I have a friend who got bored at the Newseum and went outside to smoke while the rest of the party finished up. Different strokes and all that... I felt like I could move into that place!

First, do have you have tickets for the White House (must be organized in advance through your Congressperson or Senator) and the Capital tour?

Second, you can race through parts of the museums in the time you have allowed - but you can also spend more time at any of them. I would go to the web sites of each to determine you must sees and your can misses.

Keep in mind there may be lines to get into some of the places you've mentioned due to limitations on the number of visitors permitted. When we were to go to Ford's Theatre, the line wrapped all the way around the block with about an hour wait, and we waited in line for over an hour to see the Archives. At the Holocaust Museum, we received timed tickets~we got there at 10am and had to come back at 1:30pm. Also, check websites for operating hours. If you're going after September 30, Arlington closes at 5pm; the Museum of American History is open until 7:30 on days with extended hours, but it's subject to change.

As nytraveler suggested, prioritize what you MUST see. Do those first, and if you have time, hit the other sites.

You can get a timed entry pass for the Archives through the www.recreation.gov website. We did that for our visit in late May and the guard seemed very surprised that we had timed entry. The entry is opposite from where everyone lines up for regular entry (the line there was quite long) and when we approached it I wasn't sure if we were in the right spot because there was no one else around. I guess not a lot of people take advantage of the timed entry for the Archives.

I love museums and can spend most of the day at one. However, we were in and out of the Museum of American History in less than 2 hours - we were there during peak school group tour time and the day we went the museum was packed to the gills with middle school and high school groups. I was kind of surprised at how poorly some of the kids were behaving (we even saw a group of boys fighting on one of the escalators), but we left early more because of how deafening the noise level was. That many kids yelling, shouting, screaming at each other and paired with the acoustics of the building - I found myself shouting at my daughter standing right next to me, just so she could hear what I was saying. My ears were ringing for a good while after we left.

Good to know about the timed ticket at the Archives, chepar, thank you!

I think the hordes of school children are what I like least about DC.... :( and I am always surprised and a bit disappointed when I witness how horrible the behavior is of some of them~climbing on the monuments as if they are playground equipment, laughing and making jokes in the Holocaust museum.......

I assume you already applied for a White House tour and that is the time you are given. Since all you can bring is a wallet and cell phone in your pocket--no daypack, no camera, no purse, etc, see your list--you may want to build in time to go back to your hotel to get those before proceeding with your day.

We probably spent closer to 45 minutes in the White House. We also were told by the guard after we got outside that we would be allowed to take pictures of ourselves standing in front of it with our cell phones. A nice surprise. We also found the guards in each room to be friendly and would explain things quite well if asked.