Off-the-beaten track things to do:

1. Dunbarton Oaks, Georgetown -- beautiful house, gardens, museum
2. Hillwood House -- Van Ness -- same; collection of Russian art, Fabrege eggs, great gardens
3. Walk around Adams Morgan or Georgetown

Old Town Alexandria
Phillips gallery
Smithsonian Natural History
National Gallery of Art
National Cathedral
Zoo is nice
Dupont Circle area & embassy row
Georgetown

One of my real favourites - mentioned by xxx a couple of posts ago - is Hillwood House (10-15 minutes walk from Van Ness metro). Fantastic collection of Russian porcelain, Faberge eggs etc., and fascinating life behind them - the heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post. Beware though, you have to book in advance for your visit, - do it now, it gets quite booked up. Website is www.hillwoodmuseum.org, which gives you all the information, and the toll free number for booking.

Message: Hi Annapolis is a mere 20 minutes from washington DC and is the jewel (and capitol) of Maryland. So if you're staying in Maryland, you might like to add our small town cobblestone streets to your agenda. You can't do any better than time in our lovely town. Just check the Annapolis site and see what's happening that weekend. In October we have two major boat shows - first the Sailboat show - draws people from all over the east coast, then the Powerboat show - same again - you wonder who has money for all this. If you're into history, there's much to see and do in the city. We have churches and homes dating back to the early 1700's. And of course you can tour the Naval Academy, the Maryland Capitol, 4 homes of signers of the Declaration of Independence and our cobble-stoned streets of the harbor area. If you get down to the harbor area I'd recommend an Irish restaurant Galway Bay for a great lunch or dinner - food is great!


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Actually, the Maryland Renaissance Festival is going on near Annapolis through mid-October, I think. It's not really all that historically accurate, but it is a lot of fun. The Holocaust Museum is a must-see. A downer but a real eye-opener. The National Zoo is great, esp. if you have kids.

If you like gardens I would 2nd the idea about Dumbarton Oaks. Beautiful place... hard to believe it is in the middle of a city.

I commute between Annapolis and D.C. and I wish it were only 20 minutes. It's closer to 30-40, depending where you're coming from in D.C. But I do agree with the poster above that it makes a good day trip.

I wouldn't waste one minute of my time on the tour of the BEP. We did it a couple years ago and it was so boring and a complete waste of time. My pick for the most interesting experience in DC is the Holocaust Museum.

Tia:

The next time I get to D.C. I'd like to tour the Voice of America. It is a shortwave radio station that I have seen in Fodors, has tours of their radio station. This station broadcasts all over the world. How about walking to The Wall? It's a good place to reflect. There is also the Holocaust Museum and outside D.C., how about Old Town Alexandria? The Torpedo Factory in Old Town Alex has art work for sale and you can tour historical houses/buildings like the Lee-Fendell House, Robert E. Lee House, Gatsby Tavern (which also has a working restaurant next to it) and Carlyle House. After that how about some shopping at Georgetown. I have also recently heard that Frederick Douglass has a home not too far from D.C. - I thought he lived only in the Rochester, NY, area.