Washington DC Guided Tours

07/15/2024

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07/03/2024

As we celebrate Independence Day, we want to take a moment to thank you for choosing us for your travel adventures. We hope your holiday is filled with joy, freedom, and memorable moments. Whether you're exploring new destinations or relaxing with loved ones, have a fantastic Fourth of July!



✨Always Amazing Washington DC ✨🤩🇺🇸📍

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07/01/2024

Due to safety concerns from anticipated crowding and limited access caused by ongoing construction on the steps, the Lincoln Memorial will be closed on July 4. The plaza and lawn by the Reflecting Pool will be open as usual for prime fireworks viewing. The memorial steps and chamber will reopen on July 5.

Check out our Independence Day website for more information: www.nps.gov/foju

Photo by National Park Service.

04/14/2024

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DC Nation Guided Tours

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03/13/2024

03/12/2024

It's the community's favorite announcement. The cherry trees have reached Peduncle Elongation! We're at the fourth of six stages on the path to peak bloom.
🌸🌸🌸🌸/🌸🌸
Follow the bloom watch online as the trees advance through the blossom cycle at www.nps.gov/cherry

Photo by National Park Service.

03/09/2024

02/05/2024

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02/04/2024

🔆Discover Washington DC hassle-free with DC Nation Tours and Travel – your reliable transportation partner for an effortless exploration.✨

[email protected] or (571)969-9558

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01/26/2023

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Always believe something wonderful is about to happen ✨

We are at The Hay-Adams ready to transport guests to the airport.

✨Always Amazing Washington DC ✨🤩🇺🇸📍

Come Smile With Us 😄

01/13/2023

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10/29/2022

10/15/2022

10/13/2022

DC Nation Tours, had a table at the 2022 Guild Annual Job Fair @ the Women’s Military Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery.
What a successful day 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻✅😃✨

✨Always Amazing Washington DC ✨🤩🇺🇸📍

Come Smile With Us 😄

10/10/2022

Long before it became our nation's capital, native people lived in thriving communities on the land now occupied by Washington, D.C. Evidence of human activity goes back farther than 4,000 year-old rock quarries in Rock Creek Park. When Europeans arrived, the Nacotchtank people were the primary residents of the area. Later Anglicized to “Anacostia,” Nacotchtank was an Algonquin term for “town of traders.” At the confluence of the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers, the Nacotchtank people had a dependable supply of migratory fish, plenty of forest produce and wild game such as turkey, quail, geese, ducks, and deer, and fertile floodplains where they grew corn, squash, beans, and potatoes. In the decades following European contact, the Nacotchtank population dwindled due to disease and displacement. The remaining members merged with the Piscataway and Powhatan tribes. Their legacy is part of the National Mall story.

1612 map of the Tribes of the Chesapeake Bay area from the Library of Congress.

09/14/2022

Yesterday, National Park Service staff from parks across the region visited Arlington National Cemetery to honor all those who have served and sacrificed for our nation. Following the the changing of the guard ceremony, Regional Director Kym Hall laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We're proud to work with the dedicated men and women at Arlington to recognize and remember the people who defended our country and changed our history. We encourage all of the visitors to the National Mall to make time to visit that hallowed ground on their next Washington, D.C. visit.

Photo by National Park Service.

09/14/2022

in , 1814, Francis Scott Key penned the poem that would come to be known as the “The Star-Spangled Banner.” During the 's , the British Navy bombarded Fort McHenry until “The heavens aglow were a seething sea of flame,” Key wrote. But when destruction was followed by an improbable triumph, Key's “proud and patriotic heart knew no bounds,” a descendant recalled. “His pent-up emotions burst forth with an inspiration in a song of praise, victory, and thanksgiving.”

Key was a lawyer who gained knowledge of the impending attack while negotiating with the British for the release of his friend. He was forced, though, to remain under British watch while the shelling took place just 8 miles away. When “Suddenly it ceased” Key recalled, the morning’s “awful stillness and suspense” became “unbearable.” In that moment, Key feared the worst for his fellow Americans.

But “at last it came” Key rejoiced, after seeing the lone US flag fly over Fort McHenry. It was a signal of victory and inspired the lines “the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.”

The poem, 1st published as “Defence of Fort M’Henry,” gained immediate popularity and widespread circulation. Though its lyrics were set to the English drinking tune “To Anacreon in Heaven,” the song remained a symbol of strength during times of crisis.

For this reason, in 1931, the finally adopted the Star-Spangled Banner as its national anthem. Its chief advocate was Congressman John Linthicum who explained that at a time of war:

“This song of Key’s…lifted the national spirit from the vale of gloom and despair in which it had been floundering to the sunlit heights of confidence and victory. It heralded the dawn of a new day to our Federal Government. In moral value it was worth ten thousand bayonets.”

1 Flag that flew over Fort McHenry, Smithsonian
2 1821 music, LOC
3 Fort McHenry

09/14/2022

The National Mall commemorates many of the defining people and events that changed our history. On this day of remembrance - the 21st anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks - we turn our attention across the Potomac to the National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial, up the coast to the National September 11 Memorial in New York, to Flight 93 National Memorial in Pennsylvania, and to all the families and friends grieving the loved and lost. We will never forget.

Photo of the Flight 93 National Memorial by National Park Service.

09/14/2022

A freedom seeker herself, Harriet Bell Hayden sheltered individuals on the Underground Railroad in her home on Beacon Hill. While she is frequently overshadowed by her husband, Lewis, Harriet Hayden likely took over the day-to-day operation of the boarding house to meet the needs of freedom seekers at their home. She provided her guests with food, lodging, and protection on their dangerous journeys to freedom.

To learn more about Harriet Hayden, check out the following article: https://www.nps.gov/people/harriet-hayden.htm

Image Description: Newspaper sketch of a portrait of a Black woman from the 1800s. Her head is tilted so that her right check is mostly visible. Her hair is up in a bun-like hairstyle. She wears a dark colored blouse with a light-colored necktie. Below the portrait reads “Mrs. Harriet Hayden.”

Image Credit: "Mrs. Harriet Hayden" Cleveland Gazette, February 24, 1894

09/14/2022

09/14/2022

in 1915, Carter G. Woodson founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and Culture in Chicago, Illinois. The organization promoted, researched, preserved, interpreted, and disseminated information about Black life, history, and culture to the global community.

The Association, later renamed the ASALH: Association for the Study of African American Life and History(ASALH), continues to instill pride and dignity in African Americans by charting the past triumphs and current endeavors of the community. Under Woodson’s pioneering leadership, the Association created research and publication platforms for Black scholars with the establishment of the Journal of Negro History (1916).

Ten years later, in 1926, Woodson initiated the celebration of “Negro History Week,” as an Association outreach program that reached Black people of all ages. Early celebrations included plays, pageants, speeches, essay contests, and concerts related to the Black experience. The occasion spawned numerous Black History clubs, for which the Association created materials for teachers. “Negro History Week” coincided with the birthdays of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, and in 1976, expanded to include the entire month of February and became .

📸 Carter G. Woodson Home National Historic Site, 1915. Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

09/14/2022

On September 1, 1939, N**i Germany invaded Poland, marking the beginning of World War II in Europe. Two days later, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany. Having signed a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union, German Chancellor Adolph Hi**er took most of western Poland, and allowed the Soviets to later annex the eastern lands. The United States remained neutral, only requesting that Germany abstain from bombing civilians and unfortified cities.

The invasion revealed the German's new type of warfare called blitzkrieg - a combination of aircraft, tanks, and mechanized infantry formations with a rapid, powerful force overwhelming the enemy. Using this strategy, the N**is gained control of much of Europe and even invaded the Soviet Union. Keeping a loose alliance with Italy and Japan, Hi**er planned to take over the world.

Initially hesitant to enter another terrible European war, America delayed military involvement and offered supplies to the United Kingdom and Soviet Union to resist the Germans. The bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese on December 7, 1941, triggered the entry of the U.S into the war, which is why the years 1941-1945 are carved into the World War II Memorial on the National Mall. At the memorial, we pay tribute to a generation of American soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and citizens, that joined the Allied powers to earn a victory for freedom that stands as one of the central events of the 20th century.

Photo by National Park Service.

08/11/2022

08/11/2022

Happy birthday to our famous neighbor, the Smithsonian Institution! A cherished center for public knowledge and education, the Smithsonian Institution is named after James Smithson, who - despite never visiting our country - upon his death in 1829 left an endowment to the United States to create an establishment dedicated to the "increase and diffusion of knowledge.”

Smithson’s gift sparked a vigorous debate in Congress. A representative, Richard Rush, was sent to England to claim the Smithson estate in the British Court of Chancery. Two years later, he returned with over 500,000 dollars. With the unclear goal of “increase and diffusion of knowledge,” it took a decade before the U.S. Senate passed the act organizing the Smithsonian Institution, which was signed into law by President James K. Polk on August 10, 1846.

Today, the Smithsonian Institution is the world’s largest museum, education, and research complex, with 21 museums and the National Zoo. Home to rare natural wonders, priceless historic objects, and artistic treasures from all around the globe, visiting the Smithsonian is an important part of any Washington, D.C. visit, all thanks to the gift from James Smithson.

Photo by National Park Service.

07/24/2022

in , 1793, Roger Sherman passed away. Though he is less heralded than many of his fellow Founders, Sherman is the only to sign each of the ’s founding documents: the Continental Association, Declaration of , Articles of Confederation, and .

Sherman was born and raised in before building a legal and political career in . As a delegate to the Continental , he signed the Association, which pledged the colonies to a boycott of British goods after enduring the “Intolerable Acts.” It was ’s first formal collective action before the .

Two years later, Sherman was on the five-man committee—alongside Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Robert Livingston—that drafted the Declaration of Independence. Soon after, he became one of 56 men to mutually pledge their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor to the American experiment.

But Sherman’s most important contribution came a decade later. After six years under the Articles of Confederation, the ’ economy was in shambles. During the Constitutional Convention, reformers from small states fought reformers from large states over the key issue of congressional representation. It was Sherman’s proposal, with Oliver Ellsworth, that broke the gridlock and established our framework today: a bicameral legislature of equal representation in the and proportional representation (by population) in the House.

Sherman then went on to serve in both the House and Senate. As part of the First Congress, he voted for the Bill of Rights: ’s most important safeguards of .

His headstone reads:

“He was a Man of approved Integrity, a cool discerning Judge, prudent, sagacious Politician, a true faithful and firm Patriot…and died in the prospect of a blessed Immortality.”

Photo: Sherman (next to Adams) presenting the Declaration of Independence (painting in the , )

07/20/2022

If You Ask Me, May 1956

Q: Where and when did you last take a vacation—I mean a real vacation, without any of your usual chores, speeches, and so forth.

ER: I don't think I ever take one because I always write my column and always deal with my mail, but I frequently change my occupation so I never feel the need of what people call complete relaxation. I even think complete relaxation would be a little dull. Time to read everything I want to read is something I seek every summer but never quite succeed in finding.

NPS Photo of Eleanor Roosevelt on the beach at Campobello.

07/20/2022

Helen Pitts Douglass was an activist, reformer, suffragist, and Black civil rights advocate. After the death of her husband in 1895, Mrs. Pitts Douglass found the Frederick Douglass Memorial and Historical Association to preserve Cedar Hill and her late husband’s legacy. Thanks to her valiant efforts during her final years, Frederick Douglass National Historic Site exists today.

Photo 1: Black and white portrait of Hellen Pitts Douglass (NPS)