continued… At this point, we were all hungry. Eric checked the map app and saw there was nothing other than snack stands in close walking distance. We continued on the loop, which became muddy and overgrown.

Near where we’d parked, the walking trail had been a little uneven, indicating that the sea wall had settled. Near the George Mason Memorial, the walking trail had actually been fenced off, with construction equipment behind the fence. A sign had said that the Tidal Basin and Potomac parks were created in the 1880s as part of a land reclamation project. The sea wall had deteriorated, and they were in the process of restoring the wall. There were quite a few geese on this side.

We passed a little Japanese statue, which commemorated Tokyo giving DC 3,000 cherry trees “as a gesture of friendship and goodwill” in 1912. It was a little bit ironic that this memorial was directly next to the FDR memorial, since went to war with Japan in 1941. Only 100 of the trees still remain.

The last monument on the loop was the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial. This was another recently built memorial, and it looked like it was probably extensive, too, so we decided to skip it and get lunch. We crossed Kutz Bridge and walked back to the car.

Shot of the Tidal Basin from the bridge.

At the car, we searched for a restaurant. Per the Maps app, there was an incredibly large concentration of restaurants along the wharf. We’d been planning to go to the wharf anyways to check out the marina. It was less than a mile to walk, but we’d already walked a lot of miles today — especially Keith and Eric, who’d gone for a morning walk in Baltimore. None of us were up for doing 2 more miles (roundtrip), so we drove.

Much to our amazement, we found a prime parking spot on the street in front of the wharf complex. It was the only spot available as far as the eye could see. We couldn’t believe our luck! When we went to look for the parking meter, we noticed that the car behind us had a parking ticket. Then we noticed that every car on the street had a ticket. Several cars down was a sign that said no parking any time.

Realizing that finding parking was going to be a problem, we pulled into the parking garage under the wharf complex. We were unhappy to see that parking was $11.00 for up to 60-minutes, $24 for 61 – 120-minutes, and continued to climb until it maxed out at $62.

Since we didn’t want to pay a fortune in parking, we made a bee-line for Shake Shack, where we knew we could be done within an hour. This particular Shake Shack only had an automated food ordering station with no cash accepted, and was notably higher in price than what we normally saw at Shake Shacks. We knew that probably meant the rent at the wharf was extremely high and likely every place on the wharf would be more expensive, too.

After we finished eating, we almost ran down the wharf to scope out Capitol Yacht Club, where we’d be staying.

Eric was happy to see that the Potomac looked wide enough for easy navigation, that the marina looked like it would be easy to enter/exit, it had relatively new-looking concrete floating docks, and that it looked calm. Eric was feeling much better about the decision to bring Kosmos to DC. He was also excited about being in such an urban metropolis.

We made it back to the car in time to only have to pay for one hour. We decided to head back to Baltimore. Our main mission of scoping out the marina had been completed, and since we’d be returning soon enough, we didn’t feel the burning need to do any more sightseeing today. The twilight was gorgeous.

Monday was a chore day. In good news, most of the small dead fish were gone, though we did see a few larger dead fish around. All smelled fine onboard. Kosmos was covered with black sooty stuff, so Eric and Keith washed her. Most of the soot came off pretty easy, but a few spots needed to be scrubbed. Keith also tightened some screws around the boat. 

Christi and Keith walked over to Safeway a little later in the day. The smell was still ungodly on shore, though they couldn’t see where the dead fish had piled up.

We wanted to take a moment to mention that in this marina, it was calm most of the time. But every day, usually several times a day, it would get really rolly for a few minutes — and we mean at-sea rolly. We’ve frequently run outside to see what caused the waves, but we’ve never seen anything obvious, such as a container ship or a speed boat. We’re baffled about where the random occasional big waves come from.

Monday’s sunset wasn’t colorful like Sunday’s was, but it was still nice.