Arlington National Cemetery

Earlier this week we walked around Arlington National Cemetery. It’s a place we take out-of-town guests occasionally…more when we first moved to the area than recently when the traffic between where we live in Maryland and Washington, DC/Arlington, VA has increased so much. It was easy enough getting there the morning we went – easy to park in the garage near the visitor center. It was a little colder than we anticipated and there were busloads of students and tourists both arriving and leaving as we walked toward the visitor center. There was a short line to go through security and then a lot of people inside the building.

I was glad to walk through the doors to the cemetery side of the building! The first sight I photographed was the sculpture that was there….something to look at and appreciate.

The long rows of white marble tombstones flow in every direction broken my trees and walkways. The deciduous magnolia were the main trees in bloom. Arlington House is closed for rehabilitation and we didn’t walk up to it; the flag was at half mast in front of the house so there must have been a funeral near the time we were in the cemetery.

Just below Arlington house is the John F. Kennedy grave site. Every time I have visited Arlington Cemetery this has been a place to see. This time I also turned around and photographed the Washington and Lincoln Memorial and one of the famous Kennedy quotes.

The guard was changing at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We arrived a little after it started so I was not able to get a good picture. As it finished, and we turned to leave I enjoyed the frilly daffodils and understory of violets in front of the balustrade.

We walked back through the cemetery and I managed to take pictures of Lincoln Memorial as we drove over Memorial Bridge. There appears to be some renovation work going on with this monument too.