Day I- Travel and Alexandria, VA

Mark and I originally planned to go to DC in 2008, but we cancelled the trip so that we could save money to go to Europe instead.  It was a good move, and now we are getting a pretty good deal on our visit!  Mark and I both work for Sprint and we both needed to visit their Reston, VA offices for work.  Reston is about 45 minutes from DC.  My wheels got to spinning and I decided it would be a good idea to coordinate our work trips and extend them with vacation.  So here we are.  We will be here for nine whole days.  The first five days we are staying close to the office, and the final four days will be very close to DC.

Our journey started this morning.  Mark's mom graciously gave up her one sleep-in day to take us to the airport, and she was supposed to pick us up at 6:45 am.  When she called at 6:40 to say she was on our street, there was just one problem:  We were fast asleep.  Nothing like a phone call like that to get you going in the morning!  Luckily we had completely packed the night before, so although we were rushed we were able to leave about 7.  We had a direct, uneventful flight into Dulles.  We took the shuttle to our rental car (an Escape) and drove to the Sierra Inn.  The hotel is very nice and it's huge- it's like a big New York studio apartment!  It even has an office area and kitchen:

I'm usually a big-time planner, but we didn't have much notice for this trip and we don't really have any set plans.  We grabbed a quick lunch and then came back for a nap.  Then we decided to take a short trip to Alexandria, VA.

Our guidebook says that Alexandria was once "a bustling river port before anyone had even dreamed of a District of Columbia- or a United States!  When the time came to plan for revolution, George Washington and the other founding fathers did some important planning in what is now called Old Town" which is where we spent our time.  Old Town is a storybook picture from a time long ago.  The sidewalks are brick and the buildings are three hundred years old.  We strolled the main strip and stopped to get a vanilla bean cupcake with mocha icing at Alexandria Cupcake.

We then came across a store called Ten Thousand Villages, which sells fair trade crafts from around the world.  Do you know what fair trade is?  The link gives more info, but basically it's a sustainable business model to help promote business in developing countries.  It's something I recently discovered and have been wanting to learn more about, so a whole store full of these goodies was right up my alley.  Mark got some coffee and a book, and I got these pretty rings made by women in Indonesia:

From there we strolled the brick sidewalks for a bit and eventually came to a stop at an Irish bar- I can't remember the name.  We got to talking to the couple next to us.  They had lived in the area for a year, but before that they lived in Kansas City for two years!  They were very interesting.  My dad really likes to do photography and so did this guy- check out his site!  I was very impressed (and sort of glad my dad wasn't with us because we would have never left that place).

Next was a place from our guidebook- the Union Street Public House:

It was okay.  It was in a really cool old building, but the guidebook said it was known for its local beer and we were a little disappointed in their beer selection.  After dinner we grabbed some ice cream from a place that looked like it was from the 50s, and then we headed back to our hotel.  The roads are crazy here- we knew driving in DC was bad so we are avoiding that area, but even the surrounding areas are not fun.  The lanes are narrow, people are rude, and the tolls are expensive.  Those of you who have ever driven with the Mister know how he sees himself (as the enforcer of all road rules, both official rules and unofficial), but he was pretty well-behaved. 

Tomorrow we head to Baltimore for another day trip!