Travel to Washington DC (IAD), USA

Washington, D.C. is the capital of the United States of America and the seat of its three branches of government, as well as the federal district of the U.S. The city has an unparalleled collection of free, public museums and the lion's share of the nation's most treasured monuments and memorials. The vistas on the National Mall between the Capitol, Washington Monument, White House, and Lincoln Memorial are famous throughout the world as icons of the world's wealthiest and most powerful nation.

D.C. shed its former reputation as a boring and dangerous city and it now has shopping, dining, and nightlife befitting a world-class metropolis. Travelers will find the city new, exciting, and decidedly cosmopolitan and international.

Popular Vacation Hotspots in Washington DC (IAD), USA

The National Mall is a unique National Park, filled with an intense concentration of monuments, memorials, museums, and monumental government buildings instantly recognizable to people all over the world. The Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, the Vietnam War Memorial, the Korean War Veterans Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial, the National Gallery of Art, the National Air and Space Museum, the National Museum of Natural History, and the Holocaust Museum, are just a few of the top attractions on the National Mall. To walk down the National Mall is to thread the halls of world power in the modern era. Here the world's most powerful politicians and their staffs fill the grand neo-classical buildings of the three branches of US Government, making decisions that reverberate in the remotest corners of the world.

The East End, just north of the National Mall, includes many more museums and attractions, including the Newseum, the International Spy Museum, the National Portrait Gallery, the American Art Museum, and the home of an original copy of the Constitution at the National Archives.

The White House, as well as Textile Museum and the Kennedy Center, are located in the West End. The Capitol Building and the Supreme Court are on Capitol Hill. Another attraction here that shouldn't be missed is the Library of Congress, which has some of the most beautiful architecture that can be seen in the city.

The free National Zoo in Upper Northwest is one of the nation's most prestigious zoos, and the National Cathedral is an awe-inspiring mammoth. Dupont Circle is home too much of Embassy Row, an impressive stretch of some 50 foreign-owned historic and modernist mansions along Massachusetts Ave, as well as several brilliant small museums, such as the Phillips Collection and the Woodrow Wilson House.

The historic neighborhood of Georgetown is another great sightseeing destination, full of beautiful old colonial buildings, the 200+ year-old Jesuit campus of Georgetown University, a pleasant waterfront, and the infamous Exorcist steps.

By car or bus, you can get to some of the capital's more far-flung and less-frequented attractions, like the National Arboretum in the Northeast, or the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in eastern Anacostia. By taking the Metro red line to Brookland-CUA, you can easily visit the magnificent Catholic Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. This is the largest Catholic Church in North America.

5 stars and 4 stars Hotels near Washington Dulles International Airport Washington DC (IAD), USA