The District I

What do you do when you are in town on a Sunday, fresh off of three days at the National Press Photographer's Northern Short Course, and made a promise to yourself that you would take more photos? Well, you head into the District with your camera and little else. I rode the Metro and exited at Federal Triangle. After emerging above ground, I turned and immediately saw the red hat coming (image 1), so I stopped turned and made my first photo of the day.
As I made my way towards the Mall, I noticed some police activity, and then saw people starting to form along Constitution Avenue. It looked like a parade was going to start, but I couldn't imagine what the occasion was, so I crossed the street and entered the Smithsonian National Natural History Museum and spent about 20 minutes photographing the male African elephant in the Rotunda (Triptych).
Leaving the museum I found a bench to wait for the parade to start and it didn't take me long to realize that this was the St. Patrick's Day parade. My internal calendar is still getting over the move. So I set my camera to ISO200 and f22, which resulted in shutter speeds around 20 to 40, allowing me to get some movement in the dancers feet (image 3), and to get some pretty cool panning stuff. The last photo of the day is a couple leaving the parade route. The american bag chairs caught my eye, so I followed them. Now off to find a Guiness.