Arlington Cemetary
A weekend back J and I had friends in town and together we went out to Arlington cemetary. It was a beautiful spring day, bright with the most amazing blue sky but thankfully not too hot.
We joined a DC by foot walking tour of the cemetary, which was great and I would highly reommend.
The cemetary is a beautiful place, so full of nature and greenery and incredibly calm and moving to visit. After a certain year all the gravestones are the same. They are also placed to be in horizontal lines which stretch out as far as the eye can see in some places.
One of the Kennedy’s, Edward I think, had this simple white wooden cross as his tombstone.
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is famous and not quite what I wa expecting. They have a guard watching it at all times so you can’t actually get very close to it. It’s also interesting that now they have much better record systems the number of unknowns is decreasing hugely.
Every half hour they change the guard who watch over the tomb of the unknown soldier. It’s an interesting display. The inspection of the new guard (as shown below) is very twiddly. Also all the guards have to be between 5’10” and 6’2″ and have a 28″ – 32″ waist! This is so the guards can fit the uniform and look uniform too!
The graves range from many years but some are newer than others. This one with the rock stood out to me. The rock has written on it:
Never forgot
Forever loved
I went there with my high school choir one summer while we were in DC. We went to see the changing of the guard and to present a wreath at the tomb. I had no idea about the height/waist requirement, though!