A Fitting Finale of our Nation's Foundation

We had a full day ahead of us with two final stops before making the eight hour drive back to Northwest Ohio. Thursday morning, I awoke looking forward to the day, and also excited to head back to my own bed (and my kitties)! Checkout time was at noon, and our tour of the Pentagon was not until 1pm, so we were able to take our time packing up and bid farewell to the Hilton Garden Inn of Arlington, our home away from home for the last three days. After stopping for breakfast at a downtown cafe, we took a final drive through the city before heading to the Pentagon for our tour. I highly recommend booking a tour here if you're visiting Washington D.C. or the surrounding areas, though I recommend booking as much in advance as you can. (Not just for the Pentagon tours, but for all tours of important buildings and museums in D.C.) To book a tour of the Pentagon, you can go here. If you book a tour at the Pentagon, you should be prepared to go through numerous forms of security check. The Pentagon is the headquarters for the United States Department of Defense, and as such, security is highly prioritized. The employees of the Pentagon that run security for the tours are very prompt with timing. Nanny, PawPaw and I arrived early to our tour and had to wait outside of the facility for over an hour in the blazing September sun.

Once through outdoor security, and through the entry way, we checked in at the front of the building, went through a third security check and were ushered into a large waiting room. The Pentagon does not recommend bringing cell phones or cameras, which you are notified of in your emails sent providing status updates and available online, so we had left ours in the car. If you do bring them in, the waiting room does have one photo op that you are able to take pictures at, that makes it appear that you are the President of the United States during a press conference. With one final opportunity to use the bathroom and a quick jaunt through the gift shop, we began our tour of "the world's largest office building". At 6,500,000 sq ft, the Pentagon building house 17.5 miles worth of office space for its 26,000 employees. The tours are given by Pentagon employees who offer personal stories, informative facts, and are vastly knowledgeable on a variety of Pentagon related questions (though they may not be able to answer them during the tour). The tour took a little over an hour and upon exiting the tour, you are led right outside under direct supervision.

Following our tour of the Pentagon, we headed about 10 minutes away to stop at arguably one of the most famous cemeteries in the world, Arlington National Cemetery. 624 acres of sacred ground featuring headstones for our armed forces, including the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Regrettably, the cemetery was very busy, as I assume is standard and we didn't get to stay much longer than a half hour. Walking among the rows of headstones was a solemn experience, and enough to make anyone speechless. With a wistful look from which we were leaving, we began the trek towards the entrance to make one last pit stop before beginning our 8 hour journey back to Ohio.

Whilst our time in our nation's capitol was wonderful, it was also exhausting. We fit within our few days numerous tours, tourist attractions, monuments and miles of walking into our days in D.C. We learned a lot, saw even more, but were terribly ready to head home and sleep in our own beds again. With some tunes for the road and our experiences to look back on, the drive went by without a hitch, although in our eagerness to arrive home seemed to take longer than our drive into Washington. Finally, around 10pm we arrived back to my apartment with more than what we left with. Some souvenirs, an abundance of stories, and lots of photos and memories to look back on.