Maryland - Day 26 - DC suburbs

Cherry Hill Park
Tuesday, 26 February 2019

really pretty sunrise this morning

today's route, as usual

today's route, in closeup

I've heard forever about places like Bethesda and Chevy Chase and Silver Spring, and I've been to them, too, for various reasons in the distant past.  But today I wanted to get an idea of where they are and what they look like, and it turned out to be not what I expected.

Almost as soon as I'd turned west off Route 1, I passed the National Archives.  I was a little confused because I've been to the National Archive building in downtown Washington, DC, and seen the Constitution and so forth.  But as far as I can tell, this is additional material - and it sounds like they have a lot of it.  https://www.archives.gov/college-park  This is where you'd go to check out the JFK assassination records, for instance.  I'll bet this is a fascinating place to visit.

I passed a sign that said "Mary Harris 'Mother' Jones."  That's actually all the sign said and I couldn't figure out why it was there, so I looked it up.  She lived here for years and died on a farm near where the sign was, but I still don't know why the sign was there.  I'm adding a link to her biography because it sounds like she was a fascinating person - and a real tough cookie.  www.biography.com/mother-jones  In her day, she was known as one of the most dangerous women in America.  (I can't help but wonder who were the most dangerous men.)

From the map online I thought Thayer Ave. in Silver Spring (I think, these towns all seem to run together) was an arterial street - but it wasn't, the map lied.  Again.  It was a fairly narrow residential street, made more so by construction vehicles and workers.  The houses and apartments looked like they were mostly built in the first 3 decades of the 20th century.  Lots of trees.  In fact, the whole area looked like that.  I'd figured I'd see some really spiffy places, and I'm sure they're there, but what I mostly saw didn't look any fancier than the old area of Austin.

I saw a pale gray squirrel chase a black squirrel across the street and noticed them especially because of the contrast in colors.  I stopped to make a note of seeing a black squirrel, and then I saw the squirrel had stopped on the trunk of a bush and was staring back at me.  And then I saw a 2nd black squirrel running around nearby.  I don't remember seeing black squirrels since - was it the Finger Lakes area in NY?  (internet photo, not mine)

I ended up on a narrow side street in downtown Silver Spring and found the same ethnic diversity that seems to prevail in nearby Washington, DC.  I passed a Jamaican restaurant and an Ethiopian restaurant, almost next door to each other.  The Guatemalan consulate was just a few blocks away.  Every time I've visited DC I've thought it must be an amazing area to eat your way through.

I passed the National 4-H Youth Conference Center, which hosts the annual National Science Bowl.

I learned that Connecticut Avenue, one of the main arteries in the area, suffers from uncoordinated traffic signals.  (My father was a traffic engineer, so I tend to think in those terms.)

Walter Reed complex

I passed Walter Reed Hospital, aka Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.  It's enormous, as you can see from this aerial photo that I obviously didn't take.  I was driving along the road in the bottom of this photo and the traffic was fierce so I couldn't even change lanes, let alone pull over.

I went there once about 1970 to visit my Uncle Tom's wife Marguerite's sister Elvira.  I have zero memory of why she was there but I do remember the hospital corridors were painted that insitutional green and there were very high ceilings and it looked like it had been built about the turn of the century (the 20th century), if that recently.  I do hope it's not still like that, that being 50 years ago and all.  One thing that's changed: I'm certain there wasn't a gate with a guard stationed at it back then.  It's a different world.

Across the street is the National Library of Medicine, which I hadn't heard of so I looked it up.  It's the world's largest biomedical library.  It's next door to the National Institutes of Health.  This is clearly the block to get sick in.

Driving back to the campground I passed the Washington Mormon Temple, and I'm glad I'd been forewarned by the map.  That building is stunning.  I was on a multi-lane interstate so could barely gawk, but I did as much of that as I could.

The photo on the left is about the view I had from the highway, though the tree brances were bare.

The photo on the right looks like it's from their parking lot and I'm including it because that little figure up at the top of the main spire shows up a little better.  I spent a lot of gawking time trying to see what it is, to no avail.  I'm including a link to this web page because I think this is likely what I saw, and it's explained.   www.fairmormon.org/

The drivers in this area are some of the rudest I've come across.  Oddly, they have license plates from any number of places but all drive the same - rudely.  Given the number of cars on the road here, it made it tough for someone like me.  I guess I just need to be pushier about changing lanes.