As an amateur photographer, I find that pictures do indeed speak louder than words.

Day 1: Welcome to Dulles International Airport, and thank you for flying United.

Half an hour before our dinner with Caltech alumni, some of us took a stroll down to Capitol Hill [and it wasn’t all that cold then]:

After dinner, Elaine and I, along with Catherine and Kati, took a [much longer] 5 mile walk and braved the wind chill to see the monuments at night.

So the original plan was to wake up at 6:30 tomorrow morning to watch the sun rise over the monuments, but I’m not too sure if we can handle that right now. Tomorrow morning is a free day, and most of us are planning to visit monuments/memorials or the Smithsonian museums. In the afternoon, we’re meeting with Steve Koonin in the Department of Energy and then having dinner with the National Academy of Science – Elaine coordinated these two meetings, and we’ll be back tomorrow to tell you about our day!