We had a weekend at the DC Wharf centered around a Tedeschi Trucks Band concert at the Warner Theater on Friday evening. I booked a nice “partial waterfront” room at the Hilton Canopy Hotel and made plans for several meals.
Friday, February 17
Barb worked at home on Friday and said she would be done at 3:30pm so we could head down to the hotel. She was still on a conference call at 3:30 and we didn’t end up leaving home until after 4pm, by which time the traffic made it a 90-minute commute down to the DC Wharf. I had originally thought our dinner would be at the Gordon Ramsay Fish & Chips shop which got a mostly good review in the Washington Post, but I had also liked the menu at Lupo Marino which featured cacio & pepe and various things Barb could eat. I also saw reviews which suggested a reservation at Lupo Marino so I made one at 5:30pm which I thought would give us plenty of time to check in and get settled. Wrong. We got to the hotel right at 5:30, scrambled to get into our room and hustled over to the restaurant. They were busy but not full, and ushered us to our table with no fuss. We ended up getting a bowl of mussels, the cacio & pepe, and a mushroom pizza. Each was quite good. The cacio & pepe was made with fresh, thick noodles done very al dente. I could have done with more cacio or pepe but the dish was satisfying and just the right portion size. Barb was happy with her pizza and a few of the mussels. Neither of us were interested in fish & chips afterwards, and it was too cold and breezy to do much walking around the Wharf anyway.
We headed back to the room to get Barb settled before I headed off to the concert. I decided to walk the mile or so to the Warner, braving the barren 7pm streets of Southeast DC before crossing the Mall and getting into areas I knew better. I made it to the Warner Theater in plenty of time to get a beer and get seated. It was my first time in the venerable theater in decades. I remember seeing shows like Ry Cooder & Taj Mahal, Weather Report, and others there in my youth but had hardly been back since.
The Tedeschi Trucks Band was touring off their recent ambitious I Am the Moon project, a four-album block of songs based on the Persian story of Layla and Majnun. The band was terrific, particularly Derek Trucks’ guitar work, Susan Tedeschi’s powerful vocals and guitar playing, the propulsive pair of drummers and the overall tightness of the ensemble, masterfully raising and lowering the dynamics of their sound song by song. I was surprised they didn’t play more from the new album, balancing tunes from throughout their career (full setlist). They included only “Emmaline,” “La Di Da,” “Ain’t That Something” from the new album, leaving a lot of great tunes for other nights in their 4 shows at the Warner, I guess. Other highlights were great versions of “Why Does Love Got to be So Sad,” “Midnight in Harlem,” Susan Tedeschi tore up B.B. King’s signature “How Blue Can You Get (Downhearted)” with searing vocals and guitar playing, and an extended “Idle Wind” with dual drum solos closed the first half of the show.
Saturday, February 18
Barb went downstairs and found a spot near the gym to do her aerobics in the morning. Afterwards, we had breakfast at Bistro du Jour: decent scrambled eggs and bacon for Barb, a Florentine quiche for me. We walked some of the Wharf to check out restaurants then headed to the International Spy Museum at 11:30. We spent nearly 4 hours working our way through the two floors and gift shop. The new museum is much larger and more interactive than the old one, with less emphasis on movies and TV versions of spies, more on the real thing. It was quite impressive. I enjoyed seeing the display on James Lafayette and generally appreciated the mix of displays on individual stories as well as technologies, spycraft and historic episodes. The sections on cyber and the ambiguous benefits and costs of our current information age were particularly well done.
We headed back to the Wharf in time for the Mardi Gras parade. After straining to look at the floats and marchers over the heads of the crowds, we bumped into Allie’s GCS schoolmate Evan Schlick and fiance Miranda. then later Barb and I then skirted the parade route and eventually figured out that the best vantage point was from the 2nd floor balcony/lounge of our hotel. We spent a while watching the parade and even caught some beads for Barb. As we were leaving, we bumped into Jessie Diamond with a couple of her friends. Quite the odd coincidence to run into two random acquaintances in the space of an hour.
We went back to the room for an hour before it was time for fireworks and dinner. I enjoyed the sunset and fireworks with a gin and tonic from the outdoor lounge while Barb got a nap and saw the fireworks reflected into the room. Our dinner at The Grill was quite good. Oysters and a Caesar salad to start, grilled Cajun branzino and a petite filet as entrees with green beans almondine. All good.
Back to the room for Harry Potter weekend. Beats having to figure out my Netflix login.
Sunday, February 19
We woke relatively early and lounged in the room until our 11am brunch at Hank’s Oyster Bar. I was looking forward to both the hangtown fry frittata and a bloody Mary but they were ordinary at best. Barb stuck with simple sides of scrambled eggs and bacon. Nothing else excited her. After misfiring a little on our brunch, we decided to finally get some fish and chips from Gordon Ramsay’s. There was no line on Sunday morning and we enjoyed our shared basket of fish (nicely done) and fries (not bad). Brunch salvaged, we checked out of the hotel and drove home to rescue Manny.
This turned out to be a fine little break. I thoroughly enjoyed my concert, the hotel was nice and there was plenty to see and eat around the Wharf. The Mardi Gras festivities were a nice bonus, making Saturday afternoon a lot more festive than usual, I suppose. Our restaurant choices were good with the exception of Hank’s Oyster Bar. There were other places I would have liked to try but may have been too exotic for Barb, but there are still more restaurants and shops slated to open later this year so there’s at least a chance we could return to the area in coming years.
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