Jess Moss - Frommers EasyGuide to Washington, D.C.

The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts viewed from the Potomac River.

A look at Washington, D.C.

F or many visitors, a trip to Washington, D.C., isnt just a vacation. Its a pilgrimage of sorts. Schoolchildren are bused in by the hundreds of thousands and troop around the Mall in organized platoons as determined teachers feed them facts about the importance of what theyre seeing. Veterans and their loved ones pay homage at memorials to fallen comrades. And ordinary citizens arrive in droves to see the monuments, museums, and historical sites of the most powerful city in the world. Where else, after all, are decisions made that affect not only the lives of every American but also the lives of people across the planet? The city was designed, from its very inception, to be a worthy place for pilgrimage, with its monuments, cultural archives, broad avenues, and impressive federal buildings and public spaces. But over the years, Washington has become even more multifaceted than the original planners could have envisioned. Its a highly cosmopolitan, multiracial, and wonderfully diverse city, thanks to its embassies (and their resident staff), large immigrant populations, and proud African American community. What follows is just a sampling of the remarkable sights youll see and adventures youll have in this engrossing capital.