Sunday, February 6, 2011

Cancellation Staycation

Passport to Your National Parks -- every American should own one!

For the last few weeks, I've had the pressing feeling that I could use a vacation. In lieu of blowing some cash or dealing with travel arrangements, we decided to stick around town and spend the day doing some fun (and free!) activities. We spent the day around the National Mall collecting cancellation stamps for our Passport to Your National Parks. If you don't have a national parks passport yet, you should get one. They're super cheap, and it's fun collecting all of the stamps. Fortunately for us, the DC metro area offers the highest concentration of national parks and historic sites. We collected 32 cancellations on our long day around the mall.

Kathryn making her way through the mother load of stamps at the Washington Monument.

We started the day at the Department of the Interior - the headquarters of the National Park Service.

Although it was gloomy, the weather was actually pretty nice for a February day.

This was our first time up to the top of the Washington Monument. It has a cool view, but you can't see DC's most distinctive landmark, the Washington Monument.

Looking west toward the Lincoln Memorial.

East toward the capitol.

One of the reliefs at the US Navy Memorial.

Can you see the fox that Kathryn spotted at Arlington National Cemetery?

From the front yard of the Arlington House.

There are a number of important people buried at Arlington, but I was surprised to find Pierre L'Enfant, the architect of our city.

We finished the day watching the last changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknowns. It was the highlight of the day.

I put together this cool little map of the cancellation stations. The red markers indicate the locations we've collected, and the markers without dots have pictures. I plan to keep it updated as we progress through the cancellation stations.

View Cancellation Stations in a larger map

2 comments:

  1. Hey! It's great that you guys visited Arlington! You know, I live in Arlington. But I understand you were probably too busy to call. Seriously, it's not a big deal. Next time, I'm sure.

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  2. Pack you Passport to the National Parks when you come to St Louis and I'll take you by the arch to get that stamp for you.

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