A few days in DC

     Last week, I spent a few days in Washington DC, mostly for work, but I had a little time for sightseeing.  I was able to see the memorial for the victims of the plane crash at the Pentagon, which was very moving.  Probably the best part though, was renting a bike, (they have bike rental stands every few blocks) and following a trail along the Potomac River.  It had really great views along the way:

I followed the trail until a really busy area, where I randomly turned and ended up in the Georgetown area...which led to...

DC Cupcakes!  A show on TLC - the bakery is actually called Georgetown cupcakes.  So I have randomly flipped through the channels and watched parts of this show before, but it was neat to be there, so I stopped for a cupcake, which unfortunately melted on the 1.5 hour bike ride back to the hotel, or I would post a picture. 

I was also there over Bastille Day, where I discovered the bakery Paul, and had pain au chocolat, caneles and gauffres, which I had not tasted since France.  Afterwards, there was a small farmer's market around the corner.  They had the best blackberries I had ever tasted.  I tried to take a picture, but it came out a bit blurry.

Up next is the true story of why I have wolf scratches on the left side of my body, stay tuned...

Santa Fe Opera + 3 Volcanoes

This weekend I went on a quick day trip out to the three volcanoes in Albuquerque (they're a lot smaller than they look) and to Santa Fe with my parents to see La Boheme and walk around town.  First we went to the petroglyph park, but it was ridiculously hot and smoky outside, and kind of difficult to see the petroglyphs.  I had already seen them in Hawaii, but here is a picture of what we could see:

I think this is supposed to be people??  Anyway, I had to climb up pretty high to get this picture and my parents weren't interested in that, so we moved onto the volcanoes.  Now if you are ever in Albuquerque and you look out to the west, you can see what looks like 3 big hills, but the are dormant volcanoes, and they look a lot bigger from Albuquerque than up close:

View from one volcano to the next.

View of Albuquerque from the top of the southernmost volcano.  You can see how bad the smoke is!

The next day we went to Santa Fe.  We ran in to Ali McGraw, from Love Story at a clothes boutique.  My mom was starstruck but didn't ask for a picture, even though I tried to convince her.  My mom also spent $$$ on some turquoise, which is easy to do in Santa Fe.  Later that night we went to see La Boheme at the Santa Fe Opera.  It was really cold and raining as you can see from the picture:

Turtle Rock in Santa Fe

View from the opera in Santa Fe.

Anyway, it was neat to see the opera, and I enjoyed it very much.  I wish I had more time to go and see another, but at least it gives me a reason to visit Santa Fe another time!