Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

Welcome to another Travel Tuesday! I’m continuing with backtracking on road trip destinations and bringing you toooo the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum today!

Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

Address: Independence Ave at 6th Street, SW, Washington, DC 20560
Admissions: Free
Hours: 10 am – 5:30 pm daily (closed on December 25)

As with the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, I’d recommend walking, biking, or taking public transportation there if you can!

The available exhibits include…

• Time and Navigation
• Moving Beyond Earth
• Explore the Universe
• The Wright Brothers & The Invention of the Aerial Age
• Space Race
• How Things Fly
• Barron Hilton Pioneers of Flight Gallery
• 50 Years from Tranquility Base
• Boeing Milestones of Flight Hall

You can rent a digital guide that’ll take you through most of the iconic artifacts for $7 ($6 for members or if multiple devices).

We just wandered around on our own–one of my favorite things was learning more about Amelia Earhart here–I feel like all we ever learn about is her disappearance, but did you know that she also encouraged women to take control of their own lives (e.g. in terms of family, education, career) and also lobbied for birth control rights and women in politics + business?

Neil Armstrong’s Apollo 11 Spacesuit wasn’t quite ready yet when we were there, but it’s on exhibit now!

There’s actually another location for the Air and Space Museum over at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center on 14390 Air and Space Museum Parkway in Chantilly, VA. We didn’t manage to make it there, but it houses a lot of aviation + space artifacts, including the Blackbird and the Discovery space shuttle!

• Have you ever been to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum? (Which one?)