Great Falls--Maryland

Thanks to the room darkening curtains in the hotel room, everyone slept in really late. I almost had to wake up Isaiah so that we could make it down to breakfast before it closed. At breakfast, I had the big idea to go to the Maryland side of Great Falls before we went into DC to the National Arboretum. Everyone was up for that and I'm so glad we went. We had the best time there. I packed lunches for Saturday and Sunday so we ate our lunch on the grass beside the C & O Canal. Josiah was super jealous of all the people bike riding. One day we need to go back and ride the towpath on bike. Our lunch view was very idyllic.

After lunch we walked to the falls overlook. The views from the trail were as amazing as the Potomac River itself. The trail was completely boardwalk with concrete bridges. Josiah and Anna were quite fearful of the bridges, but they conquered them with our hands and/or arms.

The hills, the coloring leaves, the water, the warm fall air and blue sky, it was just beautiful!

And then we got to the outlook of the falls--where we didn't take many pictures! Actually I hardly remember even looking which is quite sad. Another reason we will have to go back, I guess! There were a lot of people and the overlook wasn't as large as the ones on the Virginia side.

There were also these rock structures that I had a 3 year old climbing on which led to a lot more child watching than water fall watching!

When little legs got tired, Daddy carried Isaiah on his shoulders.

The unexpected part of the day was that the timing worked out that we could tour the C & O Canal on a mule pulled boat. It was an hour long tour. The boatmen were dressed in period clothing and a woman also dressed in period clothing talked the whole time about the canal and history of the time period. I am a lot more knowledgeable about the canal now than I was before!

Side story: I told (my) Grandad about this boat ride and he told me about how when he was a boy (younger than 8 or 9, I believe) his family lived beside a canal and boats pulled my mule came through on the canal transporting coal.

Coal was also the main thing that was transported on the C & O Canal. So here was are on the boat!

The most interesting part of the tour was going through an original lock. The only way that I can really explain a lock, despite the tour guide giving us a demonstration and experiencing it, is that a lock is a boat elevator. I was surprised at how narrow the lock was. There was 3 inches of clearance on each side of the boat.

The white building (in the next picture) was an original stop on the canal. It's called The Tavern House, I believe. The tour guide told us all about it. lol. Anna learned that it takes a horse and a donkey to make a mule from the tour guide.

I wanted to find the letterbox while we were there. This is me sitting on the wrong rock while the rest of the crew found the right one! I never fail to make Jeremy sigh and shake his head at my lack of skill in following letterbox clues.

They found it though and I was excited because letterboxes just make me excited.

It was a cool view from the letterbox. That's the boat we were on in the canal. Behind the boat you can see a path and then some more water. The far water is the Potomac River. I thought it was really interesting how close the canal followed the river.

The original agenda for Sunday was to go to the National Arboretum. I didn't think we would spend *that* much time at the arboretum which is why I suggested going back to the falls. I almost thought everyone would just want to go home and skip the arboretum, but that was not the case. It was 22 miles and 45 minutes from the falls to the arboretum--just the right distance for Isaiah (and Anna) to catch a nap. Aliza and Josiah were pretty excited to see the Washington Monument as we drove. Isaiah and Anna were sleeping when we arrived so I decided that we should drive around the park and see the different collections. At this point we weren't up for any long walks although Josiah saw a lot of trails that he wanted to walk. We were at the arboretum for a single exhibit.

A few months ago we read The Peace Tree from Hiroshima for our Family Dinner Book Club. At the end of the book we learned that the bonsai tree that Japan gave the United States after WWII is housed at the National Arboretum and since then it has been on my list of places to visit.

We arrived at the Visitor's Center at 4:20 only to find out that the National Bonsai & Penjing Museum closed at 4:00. It was a disappointing end to the day!

We walked around a little bit, but really didn't have any energy left to do any exploring.

That's Aliza's finger touching the butterfly's wings.

Panera for supper on the way home helped rejuvenate everyone's moods.

The good memories outweigh any bickering, complaining or other annoying kid and family stuff that might have occurred. lol. I'll be dreaming up our next adventure soon!