America by Night

Unless one is living in big towns, has lots of friends in
entertainment related industries and is into partying and clubbing, there is really little to do outside of one's own or one's friends' houses at night in America. Of course, one
can always go to a local pub and if one is young, to parties. For
drinking, one needs good drinking companions and for parties, one's
body's must be have raging hormones. If not, one can only go out and
watch some light shows.




I knew that there would be a huge Christmas tree outside of the White House, surrounded by 52 smaller ones, each representing one of the individual federated  states. Not having gone there before, I went there to have a look.

But I found more than I expected. There was another train show. This is the third that I saw in a week. There there were two railroad tracks around the central Christmas tree, one closer and the next furthest away from it and in between there were smaller and shorter tracks dotted on various locations on the fenced in lawn.
 

There were smaller platforms each fitted with toy trains running on their own tracks

Some of the platforms were really small, with less than twenty houses.

The houses are of different styles and are brightly colored with some lit from the inside so that we may see feeble streams of light coming out from their windows.

Some of them even got water towers and a church!

As the temperature had dropped to near freezing point, there weren't that many visitors that evening. So it was bad business for the icrecream, drinks and snack vendor at the mobile van parked a little further down the street.

The building facing the White House across the lawn.

The street was practically deserted at near freezing temperature. Later that night, we drove to the National Harbor in Maryland to watch an ice show organized by an American company with ice sculpture artists from Harbin.

When we arrived at the National Harbour, it was quite late. So we only had time to do a quick walk about and to take some snap shots. This is the way to the famous National Harbor.

The road leading down.

A French fries stand on the way to the harbor

An art supplies company on the way to the harbor. I like the logo on top of its main entrance

Another art and craft store on our way to the waterfront.

Its entrance





A glimpse of its interior

Some simple but thoughtful window dressing in one of the shops a little further down on the same street

The steps leading down to the harbor front.

This is the terrace from which we could get a closer view of the harbor

A view from the terrace. To its left and right, one could see the pier lit by rows of light.

The signboard of the teenage toy/ soda fountain below.

Multi-color electronic light show whilst one ponders what to get.

All red

Changing to purple

To multi-color on top and yellow at the side

To multi-color on top to purple at the side

There was a huge Christmas tree right next to the edge of sea opposite to the store

It would change colors once a minute

Changing colors from blue to green

Lit trees all the way down to the pier.

The color of lighting to the piers would also change

from blue to green

Another view of the same pier

To the right of the viewing terrace below, there was a hotel/restaurant/ mall complex

All hotels and restaurant around the harbor front on the same level as the viewing terrace.

The restaurant straddled different levels

Another view of the restaurant. There was a promotion booth in the little square below in front of the restaurant

The entrance to the restaurant

An old fashioned ice-cream tricycle casting its lonely shadow

Another restaurant serving hot spicy Mexican food.

The restaurant was lit with warm colors, also on three levels.

There were fast food restaurants too further up from the terrace and nearer to the town centre

We chose an up market Thai Restaurant before the show started at 9.30 p.m.

The entrance decorations

How could it be Thai without a statue of the great Buddha?

Coffee tables whilst waiting

What kind of harbor would it be without a light house?

Went to this hotel to see if we could get the tickets for the ice show.

This is the ice show that we would be seeing

It has a huge hall.

With an enormous Christmas tree.

We were told that we should go the directly to the venue of the show to do so. We did. But by the time I flicked out my camera and tried to take some pictures, the screen on my camera showed a sign saying my card was full. I came prepared. I inserted another card. But to my surprise, it said "card error". I repeated the operation several times. Same results. I was furious. But fury certainly didn't help. It was my first time in that town. I had absolutely no clue where I could get another card so late in the night after our dinner. So no pixes for the ice show! Only after the show on my way back to the car park did I come across a CVS pharmacy where I could get another new card. But by then the show was over! So no pixes!