Mount Vernon 1990 (2)

Mount Vernon 1990 (1)

George Washington's plantation house, Mount Vernon, is open to the public. The first time I saw it was back in 1990 when I lived in the DC area, and here's an old scanned slide from that visit.

Great Falls, 1991 (2)

Taken on a day without much water, here's another shot of Great Falls, between Maryland and Virginia, scanned from a 1991 slide.

Scenic Weekends

Vintage Weekly

Great Falls, 1991 (1)

From 1991, here's a shot near Great Falls, which straddles Maryland and Virginia near Washington DC.

Scenic Weekends

Vintage Weekly

DC - Udvar-Hazy Center

Finally, here is the last of my blog posts from our Washington DC vacation this summer. These are from the final afternoon, when we visited the Udvar-Hazy Center, near Dulles Airport. It's a large extension of the Air and Space Museum, housing many amazing historical aircraft.

This is the Enola Gay. It's very sobering to realize the plane's part in history.

Here's an older plane, I don't remember which one.

Here are a couple of shots of an Air France Concorde.

A close-up of its engine and landing gear.

A fighter, as seen in the movie Transformers II.

Here's the Space Shuttle Enterprise. It never went to space, but did perform some test flights and landings.

And finally, from a simulated control tower, there are some great views of the airport and planes landing. It was a cloudy, rainy day when we were there, and the planes appeared out of the clouds just before they touched down.

I can't recommend this museum highly enough for anybody interested in the history of aircraft.

Great Falls, VA

Near Washington DC, along the Potomac River as it separates Maryland from Virginia, is a park called Great Falls. It may not rival the great waterfalls of the world but it's still a very attractive place to spend some time. All these pictures were taken from the Virginia side. The first one is a wide view of the falls.

This post shows how high the water has risen in various floods.

Here's a close-up from down by the river.

This bird may be a heron, coming in for a landing. If somebody is certain of what type of bird it is I'd love to find out.

They don't go over the falls, but kayakers do paddle in the rough water right below the falls.

This is one of those spots that you might not think about when you're in the nation's capital city, but if you like natural beauty and have a little extra time it's worth the short trip to see it.

DC - Mount Vernon

Mount Vernon is George Washington's old home, and it's all very well kept. Here's his carriage.

It's still kept up as a model farm.

And here's a barn that George Washington invented to process wheat.