RE: Cherry Hill Campground and the Metro to D.C.
If the options at Cherry Hill aren't working for you, there's the Capitol KOA as an alternative. We've only stayed there once, but it was very nice. They had their own bus that took us to the metro, iirc. We are usually there in November and the KOA has been closed, so we've been staying at Cherry Hill. We drive to the metro ever since the time that the bus skipped a run and left us standing there for an extra hour and a half at the end of the day, cold & hungry with very unhappy children. I hope it works out for you one way or another!
RE: Crockpot cooking in Yellowstone?
I have little experience with bears, but lots of experience as a cook. You can get the same effect as a crockpot in terms of convenience and efficiency by going to a pressure cooker. Cuisinart makes an excellent, SAFE, electric-powered pressure cooker. It means that you'll be putting your meal together at the end of the day rather than at the beginning, but the cooking happens very fast. We take ours with us in our rig. In fact, we're taking ours to Yellowstone next week. I like it because it gets the cooking out of the RV. I've been using it at home this week to avoid heating up the kitchen. I made a lemon cheesecake in it yesterday :-). Hope this helps!
