ARRIVING IN WASHINGTON DC

After weeks of planning for the trip and trying to figure out all the logistics, it did not hit me that I would have the opportunity to visit the East Coast until I boarded the plane. Arriving at SFO International airport at 4:00am, the majority of the youth had already arrived. This was the first time that I have ever experienced flying with "green passes," so that caused some complications with our booking. After about an hour of calling back and forth with the Southwest E-Pass department along with the ticket counter agent, Courtney, we were on our way to head to DC. After a three hour flight, we had a short layover in Chicago at their Midway airport. We had just enough time to refresh ourselves and grab lunch before boarding our next flight.

As we were flying away from Chicago, I could see the Millennial Park that the city is so famous for. I
will be making a personal trip there soon, so I can't wait to see what Chicago has to offer. The moment we arrived at Reagan (DCA) airport in DC, I felt the warmth and humidity. It reminded me of the first time I ever went to DC during a school trip in 8th grade. I don’t remember much from that trip, so I hope that this trip will be more memorable. To provide them a learning experience of planning the trip, the youth were divided into 3 teams of 3 for each city. The DC group led us to the metro station to purchase our metro passes. After taking the subway, we walked about 15 minutes to our hotel, Hotel Madera. When we arrived at the hotel, we all went straight for the cold water station after walking with our luggage in the heat. For dinner, we ate at Mai Thai, which had really good Thai food. After dinner, we stopped by Walgreens and CVS to get water, breakfast and other supplies for the time in DC.
-Diana Lin