Originally posted on November 21, 2013

A week ago, I had to walk across the Ellipse, which is a circular park between the White House and the Washington Monument. I had to walk here because the shorter routes to the White House southern side were blocked off.  From here you can see a lot of things in any direction.  The view to the north is in the photo above, and you can see not only the White House but the Old Executive Office Building to the left and even a chopper just above the tree line to the right.  Behind me is the Washington Monument…

So many important people have walked here, from Abraham Lincoln heading off to see some important war leaders, to Harry Truman on his morning stroll.  The first time I was here, there were baseball diamonds and people playing on them… I’ve also been involved in football games and frisbee out here in years past.

You might note that the grass isn’t doing so well this year, as there has been almost no rain for the last few months.

Zooming in, you can see the fences and barriers ahead; these were not here in the old days.  The white fence appears to be there for the National Christmas tree on the extreme right, which should be up and running for the Christmas season in a couple of weeks or so.  You can also see that there are people at the south fence taking pictures.  This was my destination on this trip, although there are still several obstacles before I reached that point.  In the old days, there would be lots of city traffic in this view, running down Executive Avenue, but of course, traffic is no longer permitted there for some reason… The vehicles up ahead are official cars as I would discover. To be honest, I’ve never been out here when things were so quiet before.  Maybe it was just because of the time of day, about 10 or 10:30.

In this final shot, you can get a better view of the National Christmas tree.  It looks like the lights are in place, but apparently there is plenty more to do; that stuff over to the tree’s right is construction crews, trucks, and materials.  I’ve never been out here this close to Christmas before, so I’m not really sure how much they set up.  Anyway, I’d best get going- see you next time!