Travels with Tish Girlfriends’ Getaway Guide

Besides shopping and dining, Georgetown is rich in history. First, all the homes in Georgetown are locked in time — they cannot have the exteriors altered and must be maintained in their original appearance. You’ll notice that the homes don’t even have storm windows — historic preservation takes precedence over energy savings.

JFK’s Home. One of the neighborhood’s most prominent residents was Senator John F. Kennedy back in the 1950s. He and Jackie lived at 3307 N Street. Other residents include Madeleine Albright, John Kerry and George Stephanopoulos. Oh yes, and Francis Scott Key called Georgetown home in the 1700s.

You might want to visit the campus of Georgetown University, Dumbarton Oaks (where the U.N. got its start), Tudor Place, or the Kreeger Museum of art. You’ll find about 4,000 buildings in the Georgetown historic district. If you’re interested in the history of the Underground Railroad, you’ll want to visit Mt. Zion United Methodist Church which was a stop on that route.

Getting To and From Georgetown. Transportation options between Georgetown and Union Station include the DC Circulator bus. You’ll find Union Station just a couple of blocks from the Capitol and the National Mall. Besides being a famous railroad station, Union Station also offers shopping and dining. The Green Route on the Old Town Trolley Tour will get you to Georgetown as well. (You can tour the Washington area, getting on and off as much as you’d like for $32/day — or buy online in advance for a discount.)

NEXT: Options for getting around The National Mall and Memorials

Photo of DuPont Circle (near Georgetown) courtesy of William Geiger/Cultural Tourism DC .

Photo of Washington National Cathedral courtesy of cathedral.org

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If you have any inclination to take a fun shopping getaway before Christmas, NOW is the time to act! Midwest Airlines just released a short-term sale that will get you to great shopping cities at an unbelieveable fare. The news of the sale came through this morning in its weekly fare special e-mail.

Kansas City to New York is just $148! Washington, D.C. is $149 ! San Antonio, Atlanta, Boston — $158! These are ROUNDTRIP fares!

Milwaukee to New York is just $138. Washington, D.C. and Boston — $148. San Antonio is $159. Kansas City is $99. All Roundtrip!

Omaha to New York is $169 RT. Washington, D.C. is $149 roundtrip.

So many cities are included in this special sale and you should know that some of them do start at $99 roundtrip. That leaves  a whole lot more cash in your pocket for shopping and hotel!

Here’s the deal: You must travel between November 28 and December 12. Perfect dates for Christmas shopping! Buy your ticket before December 5 — today is best if you want to ensure you get seats at these terrific rates! (You know that airline seats at the very best fares are always limited.) And you have to stay over a Friday or Saturday night. No problem — there’s lots to do in New York,  D.C., San Antonio, Kansas City and Milwaukee!

Click here for the details on these fares. Use promo code GGG if you do book tickets (so Midwest will know you heard about the deal here). Then call your girlfriends, pull out your weekender bag and get your shopping list ready. What a fun and spontaneous way to get your holiday shopping done!

Check my postings on New York, Washington (Georgetown), Kansas City , San Antonio and Milwaukee for some getaway recommendations. Then check  the special offers and discounts (on the right sidebar) available for you in some of these cities. And, by the way, please do report back on your getaway experience! We’d love to hear what you liked best!

Sandy and I decided that the next getaway we take to Washington is going to be more about exploring Georgetown with less focus on “seeing it all” in Washington. “Seeing it all” is hard work! We’ll pick out 3-4 Washington sites that we really want to see and then spend more time relaxing, dining and shopping so that we can feel truly re-energized after our getaway. I’m sure Georgetown has a spa or two that we could also enjoy.

We arrived in Georgetown on the trolley tour as part of our full-day ticket. It was early on a Friday evening when we dined at Sequoia overlooking the Potomac. A beautiful view and a wonderful restaurant that was recommended to me by Mary Jo Manzanares, author of Fly Away Cafe travel blog. Menu items included Pumpkin Bisque with creme fraiche ($7.95). Autumn Apple Salad ($8.50). Homemade Duck and Pine Nut Dumplings. All very, very good. Pasta and entree salads were about $16. Kobe Beef Steak ($23.95) Pretty reasonable prices for excellent food. We both chose the Kobe Beef Slider Trio — three small, plump, freshly ground burgers surrounded with the the thinnest fried potato sticks and string-thin onion rings. ($13.95). I’d go back there in a minute! With all that said, we wonderered why the restaurant was not more crowded on an early Friday evening. The waitress told us that their clientele start the evening later and it would begin filling up after 7:30 p.m.

After dinner, we strolled in and out of the many boutiques up and down the fairly crowded streets. Plenty of people of all ages were out and about. Then we headed over to Blues Alley, a small, intimate little jazz club that is really located on an alley in a 18th century carriage house. Mary Jo had also recommended this spot and it was fun. To me, it was reminiscent of late 60s era coffeehouses. We learned it is the nation’s oldest continuing jazz supper club. Dizzy Gillespie, Grover Washington, Jr., Nancy Wilson, Maynard Ferguson and other prominent jazz artists have performed there. Although we just stopped in for a drink, we thought the menu looked pretty good, too. From there, we cabbed it back to our hotel south of the Capitol for about a $10 fare.

NEXT: What Else Makes Georgetown a Great Destination

TIP: The dress in Georgetown ran the gamut from chic to hippie (mostly in the 20-something group). Overall, very casual.

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Bet you never thought about a girlfriends’ getaway to Washington, D.C. Well, my perception was — and I emphasize was — that a trip to Washington lived within the realm of family vacations or 8th grade field trips. But that’s really not the case. I just visited Washington with my friend, Sandy (who had never been there before), and we had a terrific time.

First of all, let me suggest you focus on Georgetown as your base of operations for this trip. It is a definitive getaway town — actually the oldest Washington, D.C. neighborhood, northwest of the city. It’s historic, picturesque, upscale, lively and filled with great shopping, dining and sightseeing opportunities. No malls — just great storefront shopping on a number of streets. Best of all, we found that the stores were open until 10 p.m.

I recommend Georgetown because it offers such a nice ambiance for a real getaway. After you’re done visiting the Washington museums and memorials, you can spend the evening relaxing at a great restaurant, strolling through the shops after dinner and then visiting one of the clubs or musical venues in town.

We discovered Georgetown late in the afternoon of our last day in Washington. We decided to end our ride on the tour trolley in Georgetown and spend the evening. What a great decision! Then we cabbed it back to our hotel which was 5-6 blocks south of the Capitol — all the while wishing we had known about Georgetown before the trip!

NEXT: More on Georgetown!

Add a Comment Below: Have you visited Georgetown? Recommend a “must do” there for a girlfriends’ getaway.

Hotel Tip: We (thought) we wanted to stay closer to the museums on the Mall, so we found a good price at the Best Western Capitol Skyline, south of the Capitol building — had a great view of the Capitol from our room. $94 /night). Newly remodeled, very nice inside. Rooms were nice and clean. But the linens were those of a much lower quality hotel — soggy soft pillows, only a thin mattress pad and a not-well-fitting flat sheet that exposed the mattress. Also kind of an industrial neighborhood — we didn’t walk around there. We tried the hotel restaurant for breakfast the first morning and wouldn’t even return there for a cup of coffee the next day. A cab ride to Ford’s Theater from this hotel was $16. The free hotel shuttle filled up fast so we thought it best to take a cab.

Photos courtesy of the Washington Convention & Tourism Corporation (WCTC)

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