DC day 1

Driving into DC was tough, highway driving heavy rain - No one sticking to the speed limit. We made it and checked into a really nice hotel just outside the city. 
We started off at the Smithsonian museums for an entire day.

 


Entrance to Main Museum

From the Movie - Night of the Museum. T-Rex Stood in the Door way.

There were many excellent Full replicas on display.

Someones Kid

Mammoth

Full size Blue Whale

When we said we went Diving and saw a Jelly Fish, This is exactly what we swam with, Only a smaller one with shorter tentacles 

 


These guys came to life during the Night at the Museum

My Favorite Photo - Caught him mid air

 
 Skippy !

This next section of this Museum was focused on the amazing technology we have today.

This is actual Real Time Earthquake detection based on the past 2 hours. This is considered normal movement.

 When we arrived at this section, There were a lot of people taking photos of this - hope stone - I thought I'd take a shot as well just to fit in. 
Man the security was tight in this room, enough to make you feel really claustrophobic.





Lunch Time:

This was strange, So bad that I had to take a photo. Yes a 
Mac Donalds on wheels !

Anyway this was lunch. 









Next Stop: Air and Space Museum - still apart of the Smithsonian museums.


Did you know the Wright Brothers actually learned to fly by building kites

A replica of the wright brothers world record holding plane.

During the War, the navigator got the front seat, Literally the front seat. This is where I would want to sit, In front of First Class !

This might just well be the future, Cars that can drive themselves. This particular car won a crossing of some dessert unmanned and unassisted. This course of this race is not known until 1 hour before the race starts. 

 

 There was a full scale space rocket training module on display. This is the drivers seat.











Living Quarters - we could walk through the module on a defined path.










 

Fitness bike and showering tube.

Out of all of the displays in this area, This one is a little sad, Monkeys were sent to space to test the atmosphere conditions. This little guy made it back alive. Take a close look at that cradle, one hand over his chest on the outside and the other hand protecting his crown jewels.

These are all of the landing sites for the Apollo missions, There were a lot of samples and experiments they performed. 1 display was a piece of moon rock, and an Iphone hard cover. I thought this was a comparison for school kids. But just as i was about to take a photo, some kid walked up and took his phone back. I just felt so dumb, this kid must have been watching me like a hawk.

 

 Speaking of Hawk, This is a unmanned Drone, actual size.

Tomahawk

Model Air Craft Carrier

 Our last stop for the day was the American History Museum.

Wizard of OZ shoes

 A collection of old sound recording and playback devices from the past century. Check out the iPod, really. Is it that old already?

My Mate Kermit the Frog

Big day on the town tomorrow. Can't believe we only just saw the museums today, this place is huge.

Rapid City - Minneaop - DC Washington

After Departing Mt Rushmore, we decided to spend the night at Rapid City (a short drive back to the main highway). We signed up for a Cold War Missile Launch Command Tour. Little did we know that this tour was in the middle of no-where and they actually took us underground into 1 of 5 decommissioned Missile Launch capsules in the area.   

This is the entrance to the capsule. Notice how thick the steel walls are. This was intended to be bomb proof. Even if they did get hit, it probably wouldn't be the blast that would kill them but the sonic shock waves bouncing off these walls on the inside that would kill everyone inside. ohh and its a low entrance as well, take a measurement from Kristy's head.

This is the interior of the Missile Launch command. Responsible for 150 intercontinental ballistic missiles, ready to be fired at a moments notice. This was a 2 man operation 24hrs a day, 12 hr shifts. It wasn't until the cold war was over did they notice that the Russians had 5 of their 2 mega tonne missiles aimed at each of the 5 capsules. A very important job and a scare tactic that eventually won the war

Included in this tour was a visit to a fully restored Missile Silo. If the Command capsule was to be taken out. A helicopter could remotely launch each missile individually while hovering above.

Not Live - No War Head Installed

In Rapid City we went shopping for lunch making food and found this:

1.5L bottle of wine in a safeway, hell yeah Guess which one we bought?

Dinner was at a place called Fuddruckers. Kristy dared me to take on a 2/3 pound Burger patty. That is 300g of meat. I succeeded but this was a challenge. And th Bun difference, Hers (Australian Normal) and Mine(American Normal)

The Mall of America was next on the to do list. This is the 2nd largest shopping mall in North America. The Largest was Edmonton (near Jasper, Canada).

Complete with a theme park inside the middle on the building. This photo (bellow) was taken from the food court of the Mall. This place also includes 3 levels of shops and our favorite shop - Best Buy (Harvey Norman equivalent)

We also found an Outback Steak House, Authentic Australian Dinning.

From here we start our 2 long days through Indianapolis to DC Washington

Look closely - That's what I though. Any way - this was shot out the back window by the time we found the camera

Over Night Stop

 






2 Days Later - 
DC Washington








You probably remember this Map. So far we have traveled over 5000kms and have managed to drive across the entire length of the continent. From Port Renfrew on Vancouver Island all the way through to DC on the coast. Right now we are in DC just south of New york. A scenic detour route through DC. I have included our plan for the remainder of this epic road trip.

Click to view Larger

Mt Rushmore and Caves

April 11th - 12th:

After spending a solid day inside catching up on sleep and sorting our gear, we ventured underground for some caving fun. First stop, Jewel Cave. The 3rd longest cave in the world. And secondly to Wind cave National Park, the 2nd longest cave in the world. Mexico only just took the record when 2 caves joined up 2 years ago.

We took a an elevator 30 stories underground to this adventure.

Not a dirty Cave, But well tracked with scaffolding. 

Included in the tour was a visit to a current active archeological dig site, this was the location of an old sink hole where Mammoths fell into an drowned.

The building itself was built around the perimeter of the sinkhole. The scientists believe they will continue to dig down another 160 feet.











 
Well preserved Mammoth Scull and tusks. 









Mount Rushmore after a long few days waiting around for the snowy roads to finally open again.

We were expecting Mt Rushmore to be just like every other National Park pull out or lookout that we have visited along the highway, until we arrived at this

3 Lanes of Traffic control pay stations and a Bus/RV lane. This is luxury.

Just when we thought we had seen it all. We drove up the hill to this, A multi level Parking facility.
Is this the Mall?

Mount Rushmore National Memorial

A view down the Main strip

Each Pole on this photo represents a state and when each of the states became a state of the US

Just after a heavy snow fall




























 

Crazy horse: 
We believe this is the Indian rip off on Mt Rushmore. 
It costs $27 per car to drive closer, thats $17 more than Rushmore and its not even finished. It will eventually be a warrior riding a horse. 

I pulled out my big Zoom Lens for this shot from a distance

Our Next few days will be spent driving to Minneapolis - Minnesota