Between Christmas and New Year’s 2021 we’d had enough of the Hudson Valley in winter and decided to take the boys — Henry 9, Elias 7 — down to DC for the first time. The pandemic was still rolling along in its second-year exhaustion phase, and four days of walking a city with two kids felt like exactly the kind of disruption everyone needed.
The plan was the one I always default to in cities: drive down, ditch the car, do everything on foot or scooter or rideshare. Driving around while sightseeing is its own particular hell — hunting parking while the kids ask whether we’re there yet every thirty seconds — and you see ten times more of a city when you’re not white-knuckling traffic. We based ourselves in Adams Morgan at The Line Hotel, which was a good call: tasteful, comfortable, boutique-y without being precious, walkable to a lot of what we wanted to see and residential enough that we weren’t living on top of the National Mall. The parking situation is around the corner from the hotel and slightly counterintuitive to find — not a big deal once you’ve done it once.
The drive down works if you front-load it with audio books. We have a no-screens-in-the-car rule, which sounds insane for a five-hour drive with kids until you discover what a good audiobook does to a backseat. That tip alone might be the whole post.
Day one we arrived in the afternoon and immediately started walking, which set the tone for the whole trip. From Adams Morgan we cut down through Black Lives Matter Plaza — which doesn’t exist anymore, so we’re glad we caught it — and then past the White House, which is a strange thing to just casually walk past with your kids. We worked our way past the Treasury, Ford’s Theater, Capital One Arena, and the National Archives over to the National Building Museum. The building itself is the attraction. Random detail the kids fixated on: there’s a working pay phone by the restrooms. Henry and Elias were genuinely confused by it — the way they’d be by a rotary phone or a VHS tape.
From there we walked past the Navy Memorial to the National Gallery and out to the Capitol reflecting pool. We didn’t push all the way to the Capitol itself. Partly the distance, partly that January 6th had happened earlier that year and the whole approach felt strange. The walk back toward Adams Morgan took us past FBI Headquarters and then City Center, which had a building-scale projection installation that stopped us cold. We Uber’d a leg or two at some point that day — I can’t remember which — but we walked most of it, because apparently that’s what we do.
Day two started at Tryst Coffee House, which became the morning ritual the entire trip. We’d pre-booked the Phillips Collection and it turned out to be one of the best calls of the week. The Smithsonians are massive enough that you need a sherpa and three days; the Phillips is a manageable, uncrowded, actually-pleasant size, with great art. With kids, that math matters a lot. From there we Uber’d to the Mall, walked past the First Division Monument, and made it over to the Washington Monument. Standing at the base of it is one of those scale moments that photos don’t transmit. I honestly cannot remember if we went up — if there was a line or a booking required, we didn’t; if it was walk-on, we probably did. Dinner that night was The Diner in Adams Morgan, which we’d end up at again.
Day three was Tryst again, then the National Zoo. The pandas were the headliner. One of our boys had been panda-obsessed for a while and seeing them live registered hard. The Zoo as a whole is bigger than you think and free, which is the right combination. In the afternoon we hit the Hirshhorn, which has very immersive non-digital installations — the kind of art-museum experience that kids will actually engage with instead of being herded past. We hadn’t planned on it being a hit and it was.
Day four was the Spy Museum — our other pre-book — and it earned its reputation. They issue you a case to solve as you go through, which gives the kids a frame for the whole visit. Some of the interactive tech was broken, and it wasn’t always clear when you’d actually solved part of your case, but the boys didn’t care; they thought they were real spies.
From the Spy Museum we headed toward the waterfront, and then I demonstrated my navigation skills by getting us turned around and walking the wrong direction for half an hour trying to reach the Air and Space Museum. By the time we arrived, the museum was a partial bust anyway — under construction, most of it closed, line wrapped around the block, and what was open wasn’t worth the wait. The boys liked the spaceships that were on view and there was a flight simulator, but the line for it was operatic.
This was where the Lime scooters entered our lives. The boys had been pushing for them for two days, and after my Air-and-Space navigation incident I had no resistance left. We downloaded the app and immediately realized we had no helmets. We decided we would rather risk our lives than continue listening to the lobbying. Both kids were too young to ride solo, so Jen and I each piloted a scooter with a kid standing on the deck in front of us, which I’m sure violated several DC ordinances. There’s a learning curve: finding scooters with battery left, unlocking them, dealing with the geofenced no-ride zones that drop you to a crawl in monument areas. Once we figured it out, the scooters were the trip’s single best decision. DC is too spread out to walk and just dense enough that you want to be on a small fast thing. We covered the Lincoln, Roosevelt, MLK, and Jefferson memorials in an afternoon — places I’d never actually been to before despite multiple DC trips over the years, and all four worth seeing.
The scooters shut down inside certain monument zones, which initially had us convinced we’d broken something, so factor in some walking-while-pushing. Even with that, we covered roughly four times what we’d have done on foot, and the kids loved it. For the trip back to the hotel we stayed on the scooters instead of grabbing an Uber. I’ve ridden bikes in New York, so the traffic didn’t faze me; Jen had a different relationship to it. Definitely more dangerous than walking. Definitely more efficient and more fun.
Dinner was The Diner again, plus a side trip to one of those Adams Morgan giant-pizza-slice places for the novelty. I made a rookie error and let each kid have their own slice instead of all of us splitting one. We carried home enough leftover pizza to feed the neighbors.
Day five was checkout and the drive home — New Year’s Eve, ending a trip on the right side of fatigue. Four days in DC with a 9- and a 7-year-old means a particular kind of tired, but the right kind. We’d go back without hesitation.
The Reference Version
At-a-glance route.
Drive Hudson Valley → DC (~5 hours) → The Line Hotel, Adams Morgan (4 nights) → drive home.
The trip.
December 27–31, 2021. Family of four: me, Jennifer, Henry (9), Elias (7). Drove down between Christmas and New Year’s. Parked the car at the hotel and didn’t touch it again until checkout. Pandemic was still ongoing — second-year, vaccinated, masks indoors, museums requiring pre-booked timed entry for the popular spots.
Where we stayed.
The Line Hotel, Adams Morgan. Tasteful, comfortable, boutique. Good location: walkable to attractions, residential enough that you’re not on top of the Mall. Parking is around the corner from the hotel and a little counterintuitive to find — not a problem once you’ve done it once.
Getting there.
Drove from the Hudson Valley, roughly five hours depending on traffic. Audiobooks made it bearable. We have a no-screens-in-the-car rule and an audiobook will buy you most of a five-hour leg.
Getting around.
Walking, Ubers for longer hops, and Lime scooters as the unexpected MVP. DC is too spread out to walk efficiently end-to-end and dense enough that small fast transport is the right tool. Lime app, take helmet warnings seriously (we did not, and won’t recommend doing what we did). Kids too young to ride solo can stand on the deck in front of an adult driver, though this is gray-area at best on the rules. Scooters geofence-throttle inside monument zones — you’ll be pushing the scooter for short stretches near memorials. Plan for it.
Day by day.
Day 1 (Mon 12/27). Drive down. Check in at The Line. Walk from Adams Morgan through Black Lives Matter Plaza (no longer exists), past the White House, Treasury, Ford’s Theater, Capital One Arena, National Archives. National Building Museum (kids fascinated by the working pay phone by the restrooms). Past the Navy Memorial to the National Gallery and the Capitol reflecting pool. Did not push to the Capitol itself. Walked back past FBI Headquarters and City Center (large-scale projection installation, stopped us cold). A couple of Uber legs along the way.
Day 2 (Tue 12/28). Tryst Coffee House for breakfast (became the morning ritual). The Phillips Collection (pre-booked — manageable size, uncrowded, great with kids). Uber to the Mall, walked past the First Division Monument to the Washington Monument. Dinner at The Diner in Adams Morgan.
Day 3 (Wed 12/29). Tryst again. National Zoo (free, larger than you’d expect, pandas were the headliner). Hirshhorn Museum in the afternoon — very immersive non-digital installations that the kids engaged with.
Day 4 (Thu 12/30). Spy Museum (pre-booked — case-to-solve format kept the kids locked in; some of the interactive tech was broken). Walked toward the waterfront, got turned around, lost ~30 minutes trying to reach Air and Space. Air and Space was partly closed for construction with a brutal line; not worth the wait that day. Downloaded Lime, did Lincoln + Roosevelt + MLK + Jefferson memorials in one afternoon — the trip’s single best decision. Scootered back to Adams Morgan. Dinner at The Diner; pizza slice run after.
Day 5 (Fri 12/31). Checkout. Drove home.
What worked.
Adams Morgan as a base. Driving down and then parking the car for the duration. Lime scooters — transformative for the memorial loop, and worth the small chaos. Pre-booking the Phillips Collection and the Spy Museum — the right two museums to pre-commit to. Tryst as a morning ritual. The Diner as a default-dinner option. Audiobooks for the drive.
What we’d do differently.
Skip Air and Space when it’s mid-renovation. Bring scooter helmets next time. Take more pictures — I’m relying on swiss-cheese memory for chunks of this. Combine camera rolls between phones at the end of every day so the trip record isn’t split across two devices.
Things to know.
The Smithsonian museums require timed-entry pre-booking for the popular ones — check before you go. The Phillips Collection is a much better museum experience with younger kids than any of the big Smithsonians. Lime/Bird scooters auto-throttle inside monument areas. The line for Air and Space can be operatic; check construction status before banking on it. The pay phone at the National Building Museum still works as of late 2021 if you’ve got a kid who needs to see one. Adams Morgan has good walkable dinner options after long days — The Diner is the unfussy default.
Booking links recap.
The Line Hotel, Adams Morgan.
The Phillips Collection.
International Spy Museum.
National Zoo (free, timed-entry pass required at the time).
Hirshhorn Museum.
Even that's Odd 
Leave a comment