Washington, DC, part 2
Arlington Cemetery
The last time I was in Washington, DC, I was on a high school band trip. I remember we stopped at Arlington Cemetery, but other than seeing President Kennedy’s grave, I don’t remember much about it. Between the changes that have been made to the entrance into the cemetery and the additions, it was almost like a first time visit.
To enter the cemetery, you must go through security and a metal detector. I was not prepared for this, so it took me a few minutes to get everything ready to send through the machine. I walked through the Welcome Center, then not paying much attention walked out the doors to what I thought was the cemetery. It was to the parking lot instead, which does not have access to the cemetery. I made my way back through security and this time went through the door to the cemetery.
While I did have a few specific things I wanted to see, I mostly found some of the less popular areas of the cemetery and walked around.
I was not paying attention to the time, but I got lucky and just happened to reach the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as the changing of the guard was happening.
Arlington Cemetery was one of the few areas that still had a few Cherry Blossoms left. I’m not sure who George Dinsmore was, but his gravestone was surrounded by the fallen cherry blossoms. Most of the trees with blossoms still on them were all near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
As I walked around, I found several different memorials, a few graves, and the grave of the Unknown Civil War Soldiers.
Arlington House, The Robert E Lee Memorial, is part of Arlington Cemetery and can be seen throughout the cemetery. You can do a self guided tour of the house and gardens, and from the house you can see the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, and US Capital Building.
There were several school groups touring Arlington the day I visited. The well known areas were full of teachers giving history lessons to their students, but most of the cemetery areas were very quiet with very few people around. A few random photos from around Arlington Cemetery -
While walking around, I noticed that a line of cars would form at the gates to the cemetery. Eventually that line of cars would go through the gates and a new line would form. I happened to catch one of the times that they were being escorted in and realized that funerals were being conducted that day.
While I walked around Arlington, you can also do a guided tram tour around the cemetery. This would be an easy way to see the cemetery, learn some history, and, if you’re not wanting to spend a lot of time here, see the things that most people want to see and still have time to do more sightseeing in DC. After walking around Arlington for several hours, I made the short walk back to the Metro station and made it back to the camper in time to eat supper and fall asleep!
The rest of the posts in the DC series -