I have been a "native" Washingtonian for 15 years now. I regret is that I did not get here sooner. If I can offer some advice;  The Smithsonian never ceases to amaze.  I have heard Europeans say D.C. is the greatest art museum city on earth - 7 of the 19 various museums of the Smithsonian are art galleries. The good news is that in the last 10 years or so, what used to be a rough part of downtown (sometimes called "old downtown", or "eastern downown) is back with a vengeance. The new Verizon arena opened, and  began a renaissance in a huge part of downtown. There are now tons more restaurants (including a Wolfgang Puck), and many museums. These mostly will charge. The International Spy Museum is fascinating. The coup de grace hit this week with the new $450 million Newseum. It is huge and fascinating. Right on Pennsylvania Avenue, it has a roof top deck open to the public with views to die for. Our zoo is beautiful and right off a subway stop. Our new little baby Panda is a riot. He , drives his mama insane, and the crowds howl with laughter. Our Metro is spotless and relatively cheap. It is also very very safe.  D.C.  has all the problems other big cities have. That said, I've never had problems,  I would say that if you drew a ring about 150 miles in any direction around D.C. you would enclose about 90% of the country's history. These places are an easy drive - Montecello, Jamestown the 1st English settlement, now 400 years old,  years before Plymouth. In fact, when the Mayflower hit, Virginia had 11 settlements going strong. Harpers Ferry is an easy drive, or in fact you can take a MARC commuter train there. Annapolis is incredible & considered a suburb. There are battlefields all over, Mannassas, Gettysburg. Oh, and Yorktown where we won the revolution. -- If we seem a bit cold, please understand some tourists snap at us. We try to help when they're clearly lost, but they "don't need help!". 
We try. So come visit !!!