Washington DC Day 1

Our plane to Washington DC was on Jet Blue out of Oakland. This is my first time i ever went on Jet Blue, and had heard they had spacious coach seats. So my sister Vicky and my parents set off to Oakland together. We had planned on meeting my oldest sister Carrie at the airport. I actually have not flown since they enacted the new liquid rule, so I wasn't used to not carrying any liquid or gel or anything on my carry ons. In fact, I totally forgot about the bottle of water I was carrying and gave to my sister right before going through the security check. I was wondering why it took her so long to get through security, until she had told me the bag I gave to her to carry contained a bottle of water. Ooops.

On board Jet Blue, I found that the legroom was quite spacious for my 6 foot tall frame. My legs weren't smashed up against the seat in front of me like they sometimes are. I was also the odd man out, which meant i didn't have to sit next to my parents or sister, and I was in solitary heaven. Well as solitary as you can get in a completely full flight. I did remember to bring my ear plugs, and ended up sleeping a good portion on the plane. What I wasn't used to was the lack of any type of meals on board the plane. No meals were being served, not even for purchase. I didn't know about this, and didn't bring any food with me. They did have unlimited amounts of snacks, but there was only so much cookies and peanuts I can eat.

We finally landed at the Dulles airport, and proceed to the rental car location. During the short trip, I noticed that my mom needed to stop to use the bathroom what seemed like every other minute. This theme would continue throughout our entire trip, in fact me and my sister would joke about this every once in a while. I guess that's what happens when you get older, your bladder shrivels up into the size of a thimble.

At the rental car location, Carrie and I were debating whether or not we should rent the GPS for the $10 a day extra they were asking for. Eventually we caved in, thinking we'll probably kick ourselves if we got lost / made wrong turns if we didn't get it. And boy, am I glad we got it. The freeways around the DC area are confusing as hell. Even with the GPS we still took wrong exits. Thank god we didn't take the wrong exit that put us on a toll road. The GPS was a life saver, although i think sometimes it took us the long way around. It also had a tendency to want to drive into the pentagon parking lot! On our way to the hotel, I was getting really hungry, and wanted to stop off for some food. I got real lucky and spotted a vietnamese deli that served vietnamese sandwiches on the way! Score! It was pretty cheap, and some of the sandwiches were real good, except for the chicken, which was kinda bland. Amazingly enough it was the first time my parents had vietnamese sandwiches, even though all of my sisters, my sister's kids eat them all the time. I know my parents doesn't like to stray outside their comfortable chinese food, except for the american food, but never eating vietnamese sandwiches? I had to introduce them to new food, even if I had to force it upon them, which we basically did by stopping off at the vietnamese deli. This is a theme that I would continue to set throughout the vacation as well. My parents liked some of the sandwiches, and after expressing that with enough enthusiasm that convinced me that they would never purchase vietnamese sandwiches on their own, we head off to our hotel.

Our hotel was the Ritz Carlton at the Pentagon City in Virginia. It was across the river from downtown DC, right next to a metro train station, and connected to a really nice mall. It was also about the same price as other hotels in the area, so we decided what the hell, we might as well stay there if it's gonna be the same price, and see what the Ritz is all about. The hotel looked pretty nice, if a bit small, rooms were average size, not exactly spacious, but the service there was excellent. And the mall attached to it was pretty cool. It had a lot of stores, and a decent food court as well. We got in pretty late, so we called it a night so we cold start our sight seeing the next morning.