For our couple of days in Pittsburgh we're staying with Kristina's friend Kel, who lives south of the city. Nice area but a bit hilly for this cyclist :)

Anyway, this is Pittsburgh, also known as "the Steel City" for its more than 300 steel-related businesses, and "the City of Bridges" for its 446 bridges.

The city has a population of about 300,000 and sits at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers, which meet to form the Ohio River. Pittsburgh is famous as an industrial centre during the 19th century, at the height of which the city was notorious for its severe air pollution emanating from steel and coal factories. During World War II, Pittsburgh produced 95 million tons of steel for the war effort, leaving its rivers fouled by industrial waste. New laws and policies were subsequently put in place to create a more livable downtown with clean air, pure water, improved streets, and open green spaces.

And this is the Pittsburgh of today, with a new reputation for being one of the more livable metropolitan areas in the country, and teaming with students from its several universities.

And this is always worthy of a gold star from me - dedicated bicycle lanes, and even a road-side repair site and air pump. Nice touch!

We spent the first part of the day meandering around Downtown, which has a weird vibe about it. A lot of people seem to be just loitering around, with nothing better to do.

Every street corner seems to have a panhandler.

And then this happened hehe. The car was making a left turn while the pedestrians were crossing on a red light. The driver honked and suggested they pay attention on the light, to which the driver was told "Bitch, I don't give a fuck, precious! I don't give a fuck!" Hahaha! "Precious" must be an insult in these parts.

Despite some questionable locals, the little green spaces and 19th-century American architecture make it an interesting place to wander.

This is Point State Park, known locally as "The Point" - a 36-acre park at the tip of Downtown where the city's three rivers meet. In the 1700s the Point was a very strategic location for the British and French forces in North America to claim control of this portion of the continent. Forts were built and destroyed a couple times over, before the growing settlement of Pittsburgh was eventually built atop their remains. The fountain here fires water from an underground aquifer 150 feet (46m) in the air.

After leaving the girls to catch up, I drove out to one of the city's university campuses to check this out: the Cathedral of Learning, which looks like something out of Harry Potter inside. The cathedral is the centerpiece of the University of Pittsburgh's main campus. Standing at 535 feet (163m) and 42-storeys high, it is the tallest educational building in the Western hemisphere.

Nearby I happened upon this in Schenley Park - a bunch of cars due to feature in the annual Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix starting tomorrow. Good stuff.

Schenley Park covers 456 acres and is full of trails, lakes, playgrounds, and other such goodies. It's a great spot to kill some time, especially while the sounds of vintage racing cars are echoing through!

Having done most of what we intended to do in Pittsburgh yesterday, we had a down day today and took care of a few road-tripping essentials: washing two-plus weeks and 2,000 miles of road grime off the car, and washing two-plus weeks of laundry hehe.

Later Kel took us to this joint: Sarris Candies - a specialty chocolate and candies company, and a Pittsburgh-area icon (if you're a local). The gals gorged themselves on ice cream, and I demolished a chocolate milkshake; standard.

Then it was an evening walk with the family dogs along a trail out the back of their property, and chasing after any deer unfortunate enough to cross the trail ahead of us. Good times :) Tomorrow we're back on the road, and back in the tent.

We spent most of today on winding Pennsylvania backroads (my favourite kind), passing through some pretty nice scenery along the way. We didn't really pass through any of the famed Amish country, but I have done on a previous trip here.

Our first stop was the Flight 93 National Memorial, honoring the victims of United Airlines Flight 93 which was hijacked during the September 11 attacks. The memorial is located at the crash site. This picture was taken by a local resident about a mile from the crash site immediately after the plane smashed into the ground at 563 miles per hour (906kph).

This is where the plane hit, marked by the boulder that was subsequently placed there. The crater it left was 15 feet (4.5m) deep and 30 feet (9m) across. The plane's intended target is believed to have been the United States Capitol building in Washington, D.C. (where we'll be in a couple days). After the hijackers took control of the plane, several passengers and flight attendants were able to make phone calls and learn that attacks had already been made by other hijacked airliners on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Some of the passengers then fought the hijackers in an attempt to gain control of the aircraft, during which the hijackers crashed the plane. All 40 passengers and crew (and the four hijackers) were killed. Subsequent analysis of the flight recorders recovered from the crash site revealed how the actions taken by the passengers prevented the aircraft from reaching the hijackers' intended target, just 20 minutes flying time from here.

This is the Wall of Names, composed of 40 panels of white marble, each inscribed with a name of the 40 victims. Much like the September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York, it's a pretty sombre place.

Back on the road we passed through a small town called Accident, and managed to avoid any... accidents.

Eventually we arrived at our destination for the night - Blackwater Falls State Park in West Virginia. While pitching the tent we noticed our new neighbours getting all giddy over something, which turned out to be a bunch of groundhogs. I guess it's not every day you see a groundhog :)

Blackwater Falls State Park is named after the 62 foot (19m) waterfall above, where the Blackwater River enters this fucking amazing canyon on the right! I was really hoping for at least a half-decent sunset for this shot of the canyon but no such luck. I'll endeavour to drag my ass outta bed at an early hour tomorrow and hike back out there to snap it at sunrise instead.

We spent the first part of today in Blackwater Falls State Park, and I mentioned above I was going to try and drag my ass outta bed in time for sunrise today, which I did (as did Kristina), only to have it completely cloud over just as we were driving from the camp ground back to that lookout. How annoying. Nevertheless, we checked out some of the other attractions in the park. The park is named after the Blackwater Falls waterfall above, which itself is named after the 34 miles (55km) Blackwater River here. True to its name, the river is indeed quite dark - like the colour of tea due to tannins in the water.

The park has my kind of roads: hilly, winding, and green!

There are also trails scattered throughout, leading to goodies such as the Elakala Falls here. I like these shots where I look taller than Kristina for a change :)

Later in the day the clouds started to break and so we headed back to Lindy Point, where I had hoped to get that sunset shot last night with no luck. Lindy Point looks over the 8 mile (13km) long Blackwater Canyon, extending from the foot of Blackwater Falls above to wherever it ends up out there somewhere. The chasm is about 1,000 feet (300m) deep with the Blackwater River flowing along the chasm floor.

Not exactly the sunset shot I was hoping for, but one day maybe :)

Three hours in the car later and this is the crappy motel we're staying at for the next few nights hehe, just outside of Washington, D.C., followed by more camping.

As Forrest Gump said to Jenny, "I'm glad we could be here together in our nation's capital". We actually started our time here just outside of the city at The Pentagon, the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, to visit the Pentagon Memorial - a permanent outdoor memorial to the 184 people who died as victims in the building and on American Airlines Flight 77 during the September 11 attacks. You can see a distinct difference in the colour of the stone where this section was rebuilt after Flight 77 slammed through it.

Anyway, a quick bit about Washington, D.C. itself before I get into it. It's the capital of the United States though is not part of any state, but rather is a federal district. The adjacent states of Maryland and Virginia each donated land to form the district in 1791 at which point the city of Washington was founded, named in honor of George Washington - the first US president. The district was named Columbia for what was a poetic name for the United States commonly in use at that time, itself a reference to Christopher Columbus. The city of Washington occupies the entire area of the District of Columbia, and so the two names are used interchangeably. The city has a population of 650,000'ish, but the wider metropolitan area as a population of close to six million.

This is a typical underground metro station here. A little dark and creepy, but I like them :)

We spent today checking out the typical tourist sights of the city, starting at the Lincoln Memorial. As you can probably figure from the name and the guy's ugly mug, it was built to honor Abraham Lincoln, the country's 16th president. This is but one of several monuments in D.C. built to honor an American president. And what is Lincoln looking at?

He's looking at this rather awesome view of the Reflecting Pool with its leafy parkland either side, and the massive Washington Monument in the distance. As well as being a recognisable scene from Forrest Gump, the Reflecting Pool area has been the site of many historic events, including Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech which he delivered from the Lincoln Memorial steps.

At the opposite end of the Reflecting Pool is the National World War II Memorial, another one of the frankly countless memorials scattered around here.

As if naming the whole city after him wasn't enough, the powers that be decided to erect a 555 feet (169m) obelisk to commemorate George Washington as well. The Washington Monument is both the world's tallest stone structure and the world's tallest obelisk. Construction of the monument began in 1848, but was halted from 1854 to 1877 due to various reasons (including the American Civil War), and was eventually fully completed in 1888. The difference in shading of the marble about a third of the way up shows where construction was halted. Upon completion, it became the world's tallest structure until 1889 when the Eiffel Tower was completed in Paris.

And not too far away we have the White House, the official home and principal workplace of the President, and has been since its completion in 1800. This is the southern side of the building, littered with tourists outside fighting for a photo (I was the only guy standing this far back, and getting a better shot :) Incidentally, notice all the flags are flying half-staff today. This is in tribute to the victims of yet another high-profile shooting spree recently at a military centre.

Moving on, this is looking along the National Mall towards the United States Capitol, which is the seat of the United States Congress - the legislative branch of the federal government. The National Mall is often called "America's Front Yard". It's a huge public space where folk come to protest, jog, and chill out.

Both sides of the National Mall are littered with museums, galleries, memorials, and even the castle on the right hehe. You'd be here for a week to properly cover all of them.

The original Capitol building was completed in 1800 and was subsequently expanded, particularly with the addition of its massive dome which is currently undergoing extensive and much-needed restoration work. Be that as it may, it's kind of a pain in my ass from a photography perspective.

FBI Headquarters, for any X-Files nerds out there (like me :)

The view along Pennsylvania Avenue towards the Capitol, connecting it to the White House. While the National Mall is often called "America's Front Yard", this section of Pennsylvania Ave is called "America's Main Street".

And the northern side of the White House at sunset, also littered with tourists fighting over each other for photos, but I found a good vantage point above them all to work my magic behind the camera :) As for the rest of the city centre, well it's a bloody busy but bloody nice place! Building height restrictions mean there are no skyscrapers or frankly any tall buildings at all, so the cost of rent is bloody high. Anyway, we'll be checking some more of the city tomorrow.

When the land that was to later become Washington, D.C. was carved out by George Washington, it included two existing settlements, one of which was Georgetown. Today, Georgetown is a prestigious neighbourhood of D.C., popular for its high-end shopping and dining, nightlife, and quaint 18th-century row houses on cobblestone streets. It's a great little area to meander through!

Georgetown's several parks are lit by gas lamps, and even its little cemetery is easy on the eyes.

It does have its chaotic side though, with nightmare traffic and more of the usual homeless folk lining the street.

For any John F. Kennedy fans out there, this tavern is where he proposed to Jackie.

And right around the corner, this is where JFK and Jackie lived between 1958 and 1961. So there you go.

Georgetown also contains the so-called Exorcist Steps, which featured in the 1973 film The Exorcist as the location where one of the main characters toppled to his death at the end of the movie.

Back in the Downtown area now, we wandered into the Library of Congress, a research library that officially serves the United States Congress. As of 1990, the library is the largest in the world, housing 20-something million books and many millions more pieces of other paraphernalia. The Library's collections are "universal, not limited by subject, format, or national boundary, and include research materials from all parts of the world and in more than 450 languages." Although the Library is open to the public, only high-ranking government officials may check out books and materials. One area not open to the general public is the Reading Room on the right, but we are allowed to look over it from above :)

Next door to the Library of Congress is the Supreme Court of the United States - the highest court in the land. The Supreme Court has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all court cases involving federal law, and is the final interpreter of federal constitutional law.

The Court consists of the Chief Justice of the United States and eight associate justices who are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Once appointed, justices have life tenure unless they resign, retire, or are removed after impeachment. Normally they'd be in here doing what they do, but the Court is currently in recess for the summer. The last thing they did before leaving was to legalise same-sex marriage nationwide, which is a pretty big deal for this country! Each justice has one vote, and while many cases are decided unanimously, the same-sex marriage case came down to the wire with a 5 to 4 vote in favour of. Oh, and the building also has this cool staircase :)

We finished the day with a couple hours in the National Museum of Crime & Punishment, dedicated to the history of criminology and penology in the United States. Containing more than 700 artifacts and hands-on exhibits, the museum features goodies on colonial crime, pirates, Wild West outlaws, gangsters, the Mob, mass murderers, and white collar criminals. On the punishment side, you can explore the interior of a recreated police station, jail cells (me on the right), and an electric chair and a lethal injection machine hehe. Good gruesome stuff!

And that was that for our nation's capital. Despite how much we managed to cram in, two days really doesn't do it justice. To fully explore every nook and cranny, and every museum and other such establishment in this city, you'd be here for a month.