There’s the DC you see on C-SPAN and in television news clips. Then there’s DC, which locals know as the livable city where you can spend a Saturday browsing independent stores, interesting restaurants and breweries, and incredible performance venues. Your visit to the American city may include detailing the east side or the west side of the city and visit and observe the large museums or more prominent memorials and or get a few glimpses of the presidential motorcade Should you be into the television show ‘West Wing. This article will help you finding the best things to do in Washington.
1. National Museum of African American History and Culture
It is tough to imagine doing more than the National Mall with its miles of grass accompanied by notable monuments and museums. However, in September 2016, this museum of African American history and culture did just that. This recent addition to an iconic landscape holds artifacts, photos, and other media depicting African American culture and experiences.
Harriet Tubman’s personal hymnal and silk lace and linen shawl, a bill of sale for a young enslaved girl, Louis Armstrong’s trumpet, images documenting Black women’s engagement in the Civil Rights Movement, and a collection of ‘The Wiz’ costumes are all on display. Given the breadth and scale of the room (85,000 square feet), save this for a day when you have plenty of time.
2. Ben’s Chili Bowl
You cannot miss Ben’s Chili Bowl. The restaurant’s vivid red and yellow exterior on the U Street Corridor proudly proclaims itself a Washington icon. The institution has reigned over U Street since 1958 and is most renowned for its chili dogs and half-smokes, Which are half-beef, half-pork smoked sausage slathered in chili.
Much has changed in 60 years: U Street has become a hipster magnet, and Ben’s has grown to five other sites, including one within Washington Reagan National Airport and another at Nationals Park. Former President Obama has been known to dine at Ben’s, and his picture can be seen on a mural on the building’s façade.
Prepare for a lively, if not downright boisterous, audience. By day, the restaurant is a famous tourist destination—everyone comes here to have a half-smoke—and by night, it’s the ideal late-night location to unwind after an evening at one of U Street’s many pubs.
3. Union Market
Washingtonians like spending their weekends at Union Market in the industrial Noma area, a sprawling complex filled with local food vendors, restaurants, and stores. Union Market has more than enough to satisfy everyone’s demands. The District Fishwife serves fish and chips, Area Zone serves Venezuelan cuisine, and Puddin’ serves Southern comfort food such as étouffée. For a sit-down lunch, consider Michelin-starred Masseria or St. Anselm, restaurateur Stephen Starr’s ultimate steakhouse.
For beverages, travel to Hi-Lawn, a rooftop bar and open-air restaurant. Or visit mixologist Gina Chersevani’s two locations: the New York soda shop inspired by Buffalo & Bergen and the careless, rowdy Last Call. Interestingly, if you are looking for more insight into Latin American culture, the 20,000-square-foot Latin market – La Cosecha is located right next door.
4. Old Post Office Tower
This colossal structure in Romanesque revivalist architecture was completed in 1899 and features arches and towers. It has become a gargantuan fixture on Pennsylvania Avenue that also bears the title of America’s Main Street. The structure is currently the grand residence of the Waldorf Astoria Washington D.C. (the tower entrance is located behind the hotel, adjacent to Sushi Nakazawa). According to the GSA, this is DC’s second-highest structure, trailing only the nation’s most famous landmark, the Washington Monument.
However, the Old Post Office Tower is far less visible to the tourist crowds, visiting here is a cheat code for soaking in a panoramic perspective of the Washington skyline. There is no need for tickets or reservations to see the 270-foot observation deck within the clock tower.
5. Phillips Collection
In a town rich in museum after-hours parties, the Phillips Collection’s monthly “Phillips After 5” is one of the longest-running events of its kind, and it continues to wow.
For example, a celebration commemorating an exhibit by French post-Impressionist artist Pierre Bonnard collaborates with the Embassy of France to include a live band, refreshments such as spring vegetable gazettes with edible flowers, and a floral arrangement class.
6. Busboys and Poets
All in all it is rather hard not to fall in love with Busboys and Poets if you are into reading books while sipping on a cup of coffee. This place is a cafeteria, bookshop, and progressivism center; the walls are painted with murals and paintings showing activists and progressive causes.
The audience changes depending on the time of day, the event program, and what’s going on in the globe when you arrive. Weekend mornings may be bustling, with people enjoying a DC favorite brunch.
7. The Yards Park
If you want to trek and escape into nature inside the city boundaries, visit Rock Creek Park. But for an outdoor getaway that mixes dazzling landscape architecture with DC’s calm Anacostia riverbank, head to Yards Park. This very modern urban park is an anchor of the redeveloped Capitol Riverfront neighborhood, transforming a former industrial space into a slice of greenery for residents and visitors to enjoy amidst the office towers, complete with amenities such as a dog park and water features where children can splash around in the summer.
The modern Yards Park Bridge, a pedestrian bridge with dramatic, swirling steel supports that light at night, invites photographers to capture a new perspective. The bridge sits near the park’s Canal Basin and Waterfall, a unique water feature where children may wade and play in 11-inch deep water on hot days.
8. Eastern Market
Eastern Market, which has been operating since 1873, can be also characterized as the important focus of the local community’s interest as well as the site recognized as the National Historic Landmark. Before every other neighborhood in town opened a Sunday farmers market, Eastern Market was the place to come for fresh vegetables, meat, cheese, and bread and, of course, is still the place for all of the above. One might easily spend a day perusing the booths, which are stocked with fresh fruit, cheeses, meats, poultry, and flowers, as well as shaved ice snowballs, canned pickles, and Filipino cuisine.
If you’re really hungry, try Market Lunch, a 46-year-old restaurant known for its blueberry-buckwheat pancakes. On weekends, local artisans offer their handcrafted wood carvings, letterpress prints, soaps, and other products. Eastern Market, which has served the community for nearly a century and forty years, gives a rather bribing view of the modern DC life – unlike shiny new restaurants and politics.
9. The John F. Kennedy Center
John F. Kennedy Center by itself is exquisite to watch in the exterior impressions as well as in the interior impression. This is a performing arts facility situated on the riverfront South of the Watergate Hotel and North of the Lincoln Memorial, this is a marvelous and rather famous memorial for J.F. Kennedy. Edward Durrell Stone constructed the modern wonder that has rich red carpet floors, oversized crystal balls for chandeliers, and an abundance of state flags; on its roof, it has a restaurant much favored by Washingtonians for a cocktail or coffee with the sunset view.
The Kennedy Center has the roles of acting as the resident orchestra and opera for the area with the National Symphony Orchestra and the Washington National Opera respectively. Finally, the Kennedy Center wing – REACH in the year September 2019 brought back focus toward the arts. The new structure with a special focus on the intimate zones for performance and lecture has the aim to upgrade the relationship between performers and the spectators.
10. National Mall
Year-round, millions of people flock to the more than one thousand acres of the National Mall to pay tributes at the various monuments and memorials; on one end of the National Mall stands the United States Capitol Building while on the other end stands the imposing Lincoln Memorial where the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech in 1963.
The focal point of the park, known as ‘America’s Front Lawn,’ is the Washington Monument which has been designed to dedicate to the first president of America and the onset of democracy. The National Mall is depicted in so many movies and TV programs, though, in fact, it is even more impressive in real life.
11. National Park
Washington Nationals play their home games at Nationals Park which is among the best baseball stadiums in the U.S., and looking up from the top rows of the stadium you could almost see the top of the US Capitol Building. When cheering for Nats, you can get a burger from Shake Shack, beers from over a dozen local brewers, or a half-smoke from Ben’s Chili Bowl which is very popular.
Since its opening in 2008, the ballpark has become the shining focus of a restored Southeast Waterfront—so don’t forget to explore the surrounding area while you’re here.