Go Underground: Capitol Visitor Center Opening

WANT TO SEE the Statue of Freedom up close and personal? Unless you tried scaling the Capitol dome — and we're thinking Capitol Police wouldn't be keen on this — you usually were out of luck. Until today.

It's a lot easier to stroll up to the statue's plaster model in the Emancipation Hall — a part of the Capitol Visitor Center, which opens to the public at 1 p.m. at First and East Capitol streets. The model is one of 24 statues speckled throughout the three-level, 580,000 square-foot underground facility. The visitor center also boasts historical artifacts, although the pine slab where the bodies of presidents Gerald Ford and Abraham Lincoln once rested creeps us out a little bit.

More interested in the action of the day? Pop into one of two theaters featuring live feeds from the Senate and House floors. And if running around looking at all the rad touch screen displays works up an appetite, it helps there's a restaurant dishing up meals as well.

The cost of admission? Music to our cash-strapped ears (Freeeeeeeeeeeee!). So be a plucky Washingtonian and check it out. Yours truly is there now getting the scoop. Be a doll and compare notes with us tomorrow.

» U.S. Capitol, East Capitol and First streets; 1 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. on Tue., Dec. 2, otherwise Mon.-Sat., 8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m; free, 202-225-6827 (Capitol South)

Photo by Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post