Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens

The organization that I work for, the National Parks Conservation Association, held a volunteer event in celebration of Earth Day at Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens, which is located in NE DC. There were two teams of people who headed out to pick up trash, while a smaller team (consisting of my boss, her husband, a co-worker, myself, and Jon), worked at removing some invasic species in a small area near the visitor's center. It was a gorgeous warm and sunny day. It was nice to finally have some spring weather.

Our group ended the project a little early, so we took some time to walk out on a boardwalk in the park that led us out towards the Anacostia River. Nothing was flowering in the water, but the area was still pretty with budding trees. Of course, the shoreline of the river and the surrounding water in the area is completely lined with trash. Even though various volunteer teams have gone out there to clean up trash, and many more will go throughout the summer, it seems to be an endless project trying to get the area clean. It's really sad to see so much trash in such a beautiful place.

Even though it was such a beautiful day, there was hardly anyone at the gardens, so we pretty much had the place to ourselves. It was hard to walk around in some areas without getting chased by a male Canadian goose protecting a nesting female. And there were more turtles in the area than we've ever seen before. From tiny little ones, to huge snapping turtles, they were all over. With the day being warm and sunny and there not being many people around, many of the turtles sat out of the water sunning themselves. A few of them let us get quite close to take pictures. Of course, we ended up taking pictures in the middle of the day, so the light is fairly harsh, but they came out well regardless. The day was a lot of fun and you can check out our pictures below.

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens

Japanese Festival

We traveled downtown for a Japanese Street Festival, which is part of the annual Cherry Blossom Festival. The Cherry Blossom Festival lasts a little more than two weeks and includes a variety of activities; the more popular ones include a kite festival, biking tours, river tours, photo safaris, fireworks, a parade, and the Japanese Street Festival. Due to this being the coldest April in about 40 years, the cherry blossoms, unfortunately, didn't stick around too long. They peaked during the first week of April, then pretty much disappeared.

The description of the Japanese Street Festival on the Cherry Blossom Festival site reads as follows: Presented by the Japan-America Society of Washington, D.C, the Sakura Matsuri is the nation’s largest one day exhibition of Japanese culture and features over 30 vendors of Japanese and Asian cuisine; a Japanese beer garden; 25 exhibits of Japanese arts and crafts; 20 vendors of Japanese and Asian products; the new “J-POP Land” highlighting Japan’s modern youthful society; martial arts demonstrations; and live performances of both traditional and popular Japanese culture.

For being the "nation's largest one day exhibition of Japanese culture," we were a bit disappointed in the show. Most of the merchandise being sold by the vendors was either more cheap pop-culture than traditional Japanese, or so heavily branded it was hard to tell where the corporations ended and the culture began (my personal favorite thing was the white plastic kimono covered in the Target logo). There was a small stage featuring traditional Japanese performances, which were fairly entertaining and drew a decent crowd. The highlight was six dances performed by actual geishas from Japan. We watched some judo students perform, and listened to a contemporary Japanese band. We ate some chicken, rice, and lomein that could have been bought at any Panda Express for half the price that we paid, and then we left. Expecting to actually see a representation of both traditional and popular Japanese culture, we ended up walking around a big promotion event for Target, Southwest, Garnier, Starbucks, and 97.1 WASH-FM. Anyway, at least we came away with some good photos, which you can see by clicking below.

Japanese Festival

DC Protest

United for Peace and Justice along with Code Pink organized a rally and march on the Mall in DC in January to protest the war in Iraq. It turned out to be a very pleasant day and hundreds of thousands of people showed up for the protest. Speakers at the rally included members of Congress, Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, Reverend Jesse Jacskson, Tim Robbins, Susan Sarandon, and Jane Fonda.

DC Protest

Blackwater Wildlife Refuge

We traveled to the Blackwater Wildlife Refuge in January, which is located on the eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay. There is a small loop you can drive that takes you through a small portion of the refuge, but you can also rent canoes or kayaks and see the refuge from the water.

Blackwater Wildlife Refuge