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Well, I haven't been back up there in at least ten years, but here goes...

You're very smart not to take a car (but you might want one for a couple of days--see below). DC is hell to drive around in. For a city that's supposedly laid out in a nice simple grid pattern, it is surprisingly tough to maneuver through it. Between one-way streets and the infamous traffic circles (I still have post-traumatic stress from the first time I ever drove through Dupont Circle, and I don't mean from the locals on the street) it's better to park and take the subway.

Metro is nice--other people have provided links to the WMATA Metro site with maps and all. It's a bit expensive, but when I lived up there, it was very clean and safe and easy to navigate. Just be careful and plan your route ahead of time, and don't get off at the wrong station. If you fly into DCA (Washington Reagan National) you can get on the Metro right there. It covers most everywhere you need to go.

Take comfortable shoes. You will be walking A LOT. If you've never been to the National Mall area, you have no concept of just how bloody huge it is. And there's stuff to see on the entire length of it. The Smithsonian, the Vietnam Wall, the various monuments...it's amazing. And tiring!

I don't know how they handle visitors' galleries in Congress anymore, or at the Supreme Court, but on a high school field trip we got to go in for five minutes and watch a case being argued before the Supreme Court. They may still be doing that. Call your Congresscritter's office for more info, if you're interested.

Other non-Mall-area places of interest are the National Cathedral and National Zoo, both of which are close to Metro stops, and both worth a look. And Old Town Alexandria itself is pretty cool.

You might want to go ahead and rent a car for just a couple of days. Mount Vernon is several miles south of Old Town Alexandria and best accessible by car. Likewise, the new Air and Space Annex is way out at Washington Dulles International Airport, 20 miles out of town. There's a toll road right off Interstate 66 West that'll run you right out there. And if you feel like getting away from the city completely, go an hour west on I-66 and you're into the Shenendoah Valley up near Front Royal and Winchester--beautiful, beautiful country.

Don't go to DC in the summer. Go in May. DC is built on a swamp and it feels it after Memorial Day, it gets hotter than hell.

Just watch yourself like you would in any big city. Keep your money close, watch for pickpockets, etc. Don't wander too far. I think the town's better than it was when I lived in the area, but there are big chunks of DC that still qualify as "mismanaged crime-ridden drug-infested liberal-managed hellhole." Stick to the well-traveled areas, don't wander at night. And be ready for panhandlers outside the Metro stations.

DC, for all its faults, is a wonderful place to visit. Just use a good dollop of common sense, be careful, and you'll have a great time.

}:-)4

For a city that's supposedly laid out in a nice simple grid pattern, it is surprisingly tough to maneuver through it.

Moose! It was never conceived as a grid... L'Effant (or however you spell it) envisioned all the grand boulevards intersecting with the round-abouts then overlaid with a bit of a grid (or the boulevards bisecting the grid).

Your other warnings are well made.

DC is a great town but tough to figure out for driving the first time.

One more piece of advice: if you don't want a car, I'd say fly into Reagan National and take a cab (2 minutes) to a Crystal City (Arlington) hotel. From Crystal City, you've got a Metro Stop that gives you great access to the whole mass transit system for most of your activities. You can also walk to a nearby rent-a-car for when you want to make a day-trip to lovely rural Virginia (Skyline Drive, battlefields, NRA Headquarters and Museum in Fairfax). May would be the ideal time to visit, but June shouldn't be too hot. I also would agree with the recommendations to plan a tour boat ride on the Potomac, and spend some time in Georgetown (there is a great warf area for outdoor dining, etc.).

Well, I live here and I have a disagreement with the weather that some FReepers have mentioned.

It does not get hotter than hell by June.

Most of June is quite agreeable. In fact, last Summer it was so cool through all of May and June, I couldn't get into my outdoor pool. In fact, it was after the 8th of July before the water had warmed enough to not form icecicles on me immediately. (ok, that's a slight exaggeration.)

June is only a little warmer than May and the humidity hasn't settled in yet. That doesn't appear until July, and then it's really bad for the dog days of August.

Watch, now that I've gone out on a limb over this weather thing, it'll be 98 degrees with 92% humidity from Memorial Day onward. I have that kind of luck.