Washington DC Attractions

A first trip to Washington is a long walk. Nearly everything here sits on or near the Mall, between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial. Wear real shoes and plan on seeing half of it.

23 places · Washington, D.C.

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🎡 Attractions

Thomas Jefferson Memorial

Washington, DC · National MallFree

When construction began on the Jefferson Memorial in 1938, 50 women marched on the White House to keep cherry trees on the Tidal Basin from being uprooted. The next day they…

🎡 Attractions

Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History

Washington, DC · National Mall

The fossil hall at the National Museum of Natural History, at 10th Street and Constitution Avenue, runs backward in time. You start at the Rotunda end, with early human…

🎡 Attractions

Tidal Basin

Washington, DC · National MallFree

Tokyo gave Washington 3,000 cherry trees in 1912, and most were planted around the Tidal Basin, between the Washington Monument and the Potomac. Since 2004, peak bloom (the day…

🎡 Attractions

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Washington, DC · National MallFree

Maya Lin's black granite wall descends into the earth and rises again, carved with more than 58,000 names in the order they were lost. Walk the slope and the polished stone hands…

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National Archives Museum

Washington, DC · DowntownFree

Behind the 72 Corinthian columns of John Russell Pope's 1935 temple on Constitution Avenue, the Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom holds the actual Declaration of Independence…

🎡 Attractions

Smithsonian National Museum of American History

Washington, DC · National Mall

The 30-by-34-foot Star-Spangled Banner that Francis Scott Key saw over Fort McHenry in 1814 is in a second-floor gallery of this museum on the National Mall. Julia Child's…

🎡 Attractions

Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial

Washington, DC · National MallFree

Dr. King steps forward from a split block of granite here on the northwest rim of the Tidal Basin, carved as if emerging from the rock itself. The line that named the memorial…

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World War II Memorial

Washington, DC · National MallFree

Each of the 4,048 gold stars on the World War II Memorial's Freedom Wall stands for 100 American lives lost. The memorial is beside the Washington Monument, laid out as an oval…

🎡 Attractions

Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery

Washington, DC · Downtown

Walt Whitman called the Old Patent Office Building, now home to the National Portrait Gallery at 8th and G Streets NW, "the noblest of Washington buildings." During the Civil War…

🎡 Attractions

Ford's Theatre

Washington, DC · Downtown$

The red brick on Tenth Street looks ordinary until you remember what happened in the box above the stage on an April night in 1865. Inside, the restored auditorium still hosts…

🎡 Attractions

United States Botanic Garden

Washington, DC · National MallFree

A tropical forest grows under the 93-foot dome of the U.S. Botanic Garden's Conservatory, and a mezzanine runs out over its canopy. Outside, the amphitheater in the gated gardens…

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Supreme Court of the United States

Washington, DC · Capitol HillFree

The highest court in the country sits behind sixteen marble columns at the top of a wide flight of steps, with "Equal Justice Under Law" carved into the pediment overhead and two…

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Washington National Cathedral

Washington, DC · Georgetown & Northwest

Perched on Mount Saint Alban above Northwest Washington, this is the sixth-largest cathedral on earth and a full-bore feat of 14th-century English Gothic, built stone on stone…

🎡 Attractions

Georgetown

Washington, DC · Georgetown & Northwest

Georgetown, on the Potomac in northwest Washington, was founded in 1751 as a Maryland tobacco port, 40 years before the capital. JFK lived at 3307 N Street until January 1961 and…

🎡 Attractions

Smithsonian National Zoo

Washington, DC · Georgetown & NorthwestFree

At the National Zoo, in Rock Creek Park in Northwest Washington, the pandas share Asia Trail with fishing cats that wade into a pool to hunt. The Asian small-clawed otters on the…