Washington DC Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History/National Air and Space Museum. Oct 2019

If you like dinosaurs, this is the place to be. Lots of Dino exhibits and models as well as skeletons and fossils.  Mastodons, T rex, triceratops - they're all here. There is the usual gallery of stuffed animals that you see in any natural history museum. They also have some incredible gems but the most famous is the Hope Diamond, a 45 carat blue diamond that even has its own curse! They also have an amazing huge aquamarine that is 10,363 carats. Lots of diamonds and gemstones here too.

We left the Natural History Museum and walked across the Capitol Mall to the Air and Space Museum. Did I mention that everything is very walkable here? The Capitol Mall is very long but practically everything you want to see is right there. There is a red bus that makes a loop of the mall and monuments to reduce the amount of walking if you prefer. It was initially free but they had just started charging a small fee at the end of our visit.

The Air and Space Museum was undergoing renovation so only about a third of the museum was open. We did see a prototype of the lunar landing module, some spacesuits and they also have the original airplane that the Wright Brothers flew for the very first airplane flight!  The canvas has been replaced due to aging,  but the remainder of the plane is completely original. There was a movie theater but we skipped that part. Mike says there is another air and space museum near the airport as well.