We were expecting a cool front today, arriving in the afternoon, so we made plans to do laundry and swim this morning at the campground.  We finally got some pictures of Nova at the pool. 

We got there right when they opened at 10 and had the pool to ourselves for about a half hour.  Sweet!  The water is very warm and I have been able to get right in every time we swim.  Normally, it takes me a half hour to get in the water!

We liked our visit to Kura Revolving Sushi so much in Jersey that we went again to DC Chinatown location.

The last picture is Asa when he got super grossed out by Nova eating her cheesecake with her long nails.   There weren’t any forks at our table and Nova has reallllly long fingernails (freedom of self-expression) and was using them to scoop up the cheesecake.   Yikes!

Nova had a bit of a headache and congestion today.  I had that two days ago with a lingering headache today.  We picked up some ibuprofen from Walgreens in Chinatown before taking a bus and the subway as close as we could get to Lincoln Memorial, which was a 13 minute walk from where we exited the subway.

It was hot again.  Like, 10 seconds in the sun feels like 10 seconds ON the sun.  Like you feel exhausted doing anything and a 13 minute walk feels impossible.  Like you just want to knock a toddler off their tricycle and steal their ice cream.  Like you get irrationally impatient with everyone and everything. 

People cried today.  I think four days of this unrelenting heat was just too much.  We did manage to see a few things in the National Mall but it was with much pain and not really enjoyed.  I decided that all the rain and cold at the beginning of the trip was waaaay better than 100+ degree temps.

Here is the Vietnam Wall.  This was in full sun and we looked for 15 seconds and then left. 

This is the Lincoln Memorial.  We immediately walked past the Lincoln statue to sit in this monument on the stone benches after climbing the (full sun) stairs.  Even the marble benches in the shade were hot.

We stopped to take a picture with Lincoln before moved on.  We were very sweaty and felt disgusting. 

Korean War Memorial.  This was my favorite memorial we saw today and not only because it was in the shade.   It is visually very striking. 

MLK Memorial.  Very sunny but beautiful location on the water and had some shade trees nearby (and the famous cherry blossom trees).

Jefferson Memorial.  We thought about trying to get there but would have had to walk or take a taxi.  This area of the Mall is not well-serviced by public transportation.

Washington Monument.  You can ride an elevator to the top with a free ticket.  We were not able to secure free tickets and the memorial was actually closed most of the time we were here due to the heat.  The only shade is the shade of the obelisk.  We didn’t approach to get a closer picture because of this. 

WWII Memorial

Squirrel with an apple

We were able to get Junior Ranger badges for the National Mall.  It didn’t take much convincing to have the ranger just give them to us due to the heat. 

We walked about 11,000 steps total today (about 5 miles).  That’s less than half of what we were doing in New York.  We lasted a total of 3.5 hours outdoors before we decided we had to leave. 

Back at the campground, we swam and sat in the air conditioning of the camper.  We ate leftovers, napped, and watched part of a Harry Potter movie on the projector. 

Tomorrow, we go to a park that’s more “in nature” which is good because we are all a little tired of the city.  We have electricity at our next site so we will have air conditioning.  It did eventually thunderstorm and the temperature dropped right before we went to bed (current temperature is 76 degrees at 11:46pm).  The high tomorrow is 75 here in DC…and 90 in Cuyahoga – our destination tomorrow evening.  Wait, what??