There’s too much to do in Washington, D.C. in two weeks, never mind a day and a half. However, that’s all of the time I have on my first visit to the nation’s capital, so my self-made itinerary calls for exploring just one museum, quickly visiting all of the major monuments and having a late dinner at a non-chain D.C. restaurant. This’ll be a good preliminary tour of the area so that I’m familiar with the sights next time I’m in town—and that next time will most certainly be at a less humid time of the year.

The Newseum is an obvious choice, as it ties into the Journalism degree I received from Penn State (and deals with my minor in history in a big way). In addition to being about one of the most fascinating topics, it’s also the newest museum having opened in 2008 and the Freedom Forum prides itself on maintaining “The world’s most interactive museum.” As interactive as this seven-story building is on the inside, the outside stays old school with over 80 newspaper front pages from around the world. It’s already amazing and I haven’t even entered the front door yet.

Eight graffiti-filled sections of the Berlin Wall are displayed on the bottom floor of the Newseum along with an East German guard tower that rises two stories. Next to it is another Cold War relic: a toppled statue of Vladimir Lenin. This lower level also contains a bunch of historical artifacts in an adjacent “G-Men & Journalists” exhibit. There’s John Dillinger’s death mask and a cache of mobster machine guns, the back section of the D.C. sniper car where bullets were fired from a modified trunk, the electric chair in which Bruno Hauptmann (the Lindbergh baby kidnapper) was executed and the Unabomber’s wooden shack along with a dismantled mail bomb.

How the media played a role in the Waco siege is brutally honest, as it details how a cameraperson unintentionally tipped off a local who happened to be a David Koresh follower, or a Davidian, about the impending FBI siege. Next to this exhibit is one for the Oklahoma City Bombing, which I’ll be visiting in person on this lengthy roadtrip.

“Our World at War: Photojournalism Beyond the Front Lines” is the third and final display on the bottom floor. While there are no artifacts associated with this exhibit, the oftentimes-gory images are the most striking in the entire museum. You feel for the people involved in these war-torn situations, but also find a new appreciation for the photojournalists, armed with only a camera, doing their jobs by covering the world’s overlooked hotspots. It makes you wonder how they can fearlessly hold a camera straight in the presence of either so much anger or so much anguish.

More awe-inspiring images hang from the Pulitzer Prize Photographs room on the second floor (confusingly labeled Level 1). Here, recognizable moments captured in time include Eddie Adams’ 1969 photograph of Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing a Viet Cong prisoner and Robert H. Jackson’s 1964 photograph of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald two days after Oswald assassinated JFK. Many award-winning photos are less famous, but depict equally harrowing situations, so all of the images in this room are worth examining for a solid half hour.

Level 2 is the most interactive floor because it boasts a virtual newsroom as well as an ethics quiz center. The newsroom includes eight teleprompter-equipped cameras pointed the same number of chroma key backgrounds (green screens). The line and the museum’s 5 PM closing time has forced me to move onto the ethics quiz center, which uses Microsoft Surface technology (or a very close equivalent) to ask ethical questions that appear to be straight out of my COMM 405 News Media Ethics class. Since Level 2 features two hands-on exhibits, a lot more time is needed to get the most out of this floor.

There’s a lot of news history on Level 3, which sports a circular timeline of Internet, TV and Radio news production as well as a corner dedicated to Edward R. Murrow. Everyone seems to take a second to stop in the middle of the timeline to watch a clip of the late CBS anchor Walter Cronkite report on location during the Vietnam War. The timeline alcove that’s opposite of the Edward R. Murrow corner appropriately displays the latest in digital news advancements like a photo of John King at the helm of CNN’s “Magic Wall” during election coverage. Alongside this is a prediction that local news will soon be delivered “live via mobile devices such as cell phones, GPS units and MP3 Players” by pinpointing our locations. Oh wait, I have to stop writing for a second… My year-old iPhone (which is also a GPS unit and MP3 Player) is asking for my permission to use my current location to update the local news. Needless to say, this section of the museum is going to need frequent updating.

On the same floor is the Journalists Memorial, which depicts the faces of nearly 2,000 fallen journalists who died covering the news, sometimes because they’re targeted intentionally and other times because they’re in the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s hard to miss this gallery of faces since it spans two stories and eerily has a lot of white space at the top for additional photographs. The World News Gallery is an extension of this tribute, detailing slain journalists such as WSJ’s Daniel Pearl and Irish reporter Veronica Guerin. Their photos and stories sit in front of a bullet-ridden white pickup truck used by Time Magazine journalists in Sarajevo.

The 9/11 Gallery on Level 4 is just as touching, with over 100 front pages displaying the most sensational headlines that newspapers have run in my lifetime, and it’s all arranged in an intimidating two-story grid. In front of these breathtaking papers is a portion of the North Tower’s crippled 350-foot antenna. There’s hardly a whisper from people on this floor as they view the wreckage in person, scan the headlines written in response to the tragedy and take in the continuously running video broadcasts of that day.

I’m unable to check out the final two levels because the museum is closing. There’s even more news history on Level 5 and a temporary exhibit about early news called “Manhunt: Chasing Lincoln’s Killer” on Level 6. Since the Lincoln exhibit, like the “G-Men and Journalists” display that I did check out, is set to expire at the end of the year, I’ll probably miss it. The Newseum’s 5 PM close time is one of two downsides, as I had to pack my car, drive three hours, eat lunch, check into the hotel and walk to the museum all before checking out the exhibits. The other negative aspect is that in trying to prepare as much as possible and book everything online, my Newseum ticket would’ve been $3 more if I had purchased it ahead of time instead of at the ticket counter (which I did, wisely).

The Newseum is state of the art and flawlessly covers those who cover living history for a living. It’s well worth the money and worth the dialogue that everyone who is asking about the trip so far is having with me right now:

“Where did you go in Washington, D.C. on the first day?”

“The Newseum.”

“Oh, which museum?”

“No, the Newseum. It’s a News Museum.”

The start of every single conversation.

From the Newseum, I’m on my way to the White House, or as close as tourists can get. Everyone is backed up to The Ellipse, which is the lawn in front of the lawn in front of the White House. Security is extremely tight, as black SUVs pull up to the steps in front of the distant building. It’s too far away to see who is stepping out of the vehicles, but it must be some one important because secret service is letting everyone move up to the main gate now that the SUVs are pulling away and the passengers have disappeared into the White House.

After a bunch of photos in front of the White House, it’s time to head to the Lincoln Memorial end of Washington, D.C. The first stop is just beyond where Abe sits, the Arlington Memorial Bridge. Here, I pose in front of a small “Welcome to Washington, D.C.” sign that’s crooked (filled with analogies?) because there wasn’t one riding into the district from Maryland for some odd reason.

The Lincoln Memorial is crowded and filled with sweaty tourists everywhere, from outside on the temple steps to inside its 36 Greek columns. It’s difficult to take a photo without a bunch of people popping up in the corners or walking directly in front of a shot. But, with a little patience and proper timing, I got some quality pictures in front of the Lincoln statue and the outlying Washington Monument from the steps.

I’m making time to visit the Korean War Memorial, even if it isn’t on my itinerary, because it’s at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial and the walk is well worth it. On the opposite side is the Vietnam Memorial. I remember doing a comprehensive report on it in the third grade and it’s unreal to see all of the names in person after knowing about it only in images for so many years. Even more shocking than all of the names etched into the black granite walls is the thick book of names printed in alphabetical order to help people find loved ones. It’s the size of a phone book and puts the amount of deaths into an even greater real-life context for me.

It’s starting to get dark and has been a while since my lunch at Checkers, so it’s time to have dinner at Mr. Henry’s Restaurant on Capitol Hill. When I was drawing up plans for my trip, I wanted to eat dinner somewhere that didn’t exist where I live, that had Washington, D.C. in the name and that served something delicious that wasn’t ribs or steak (a lot of what I’ll be eating in the south). So, I’m taking a cab to 601 Pennsylvania Ave SE, Washington, DC 20003 and eat at Mr. Henry’s Capitol Hill Restaurant. Although I originally intended to sit outside, it’s still humid out at 9 PM and he air conditioning sounds like a better option.

Mr. Henry’s Capitol Hill Restaurant doesn’t have much of a Washington, D.C. theme, except for the misleading name. However, I ordered the Turkey Club and tried some fried zucchini for the first time and enjoyed both. This sit-down dinner took about an hour and cost about $20 for my bigger-than-expected sandwich, chips and a soda.

To get a view of the lit up National Mall, we took a cab back to The Lincoln Memorial following dinner. Viewing Abe basked in lights was a neat experience. A few yards away, the Reflecting Pool at this hour was not such a fun experience. This is because thousands of mosquitoes swarmed us as soon as I took one flash photograph. So many bugs were flying around that we decided to run as far away from the dirtier-than-expected pool as quickly as humanly possible.

From the Reflecting Pool, we checked out the Vietnam Memorial again and walked to the White House, which was in darkness to our dismay. I suppose they turn off the back porch lights at night to save on the massive energy bill. This wasn’t the case at the World War II Memorial, which stays lit until midnight. The clock struck 12 as soon as we took our last photograph, so we got the hint and decided to catch a cab to the Hyatt Regency right after snapping some nighttime photographs of the nearby Washington Monument and U.S. Capitol Building. We’ll be able to capture both of these towering, white structures in the daylight tomorrow, too. Our Washington Monument tour starts at 9 AM sharp!