The stained glass windows are spectacular, especially the rose windows. But she did quiet down when she looked up. As our group gathered in the back pews of the soaring nave, my 4-year-old refused to adopt the hushed tones that everyone else did upon entering the dimly lit church.

My family took a recent public gargoyle tour. Her book, 'The Gargoyles and Other Select Grotesques of Washington National Cathedral,' is due out this fall. The author grew up in the shadow of the cathedral and was inspired to collect all the unique stories behind the magnificent carvings after taking a gargoyle tour a couple of years ago. According to Wendy Gasch, a local ophthalmologist who just finished a book about the cathedral's gargoyles, the limestone was selected in 1910 after a four-year search because of its adaptability for carving. Like the rest of the cathedral, built in the 14th-century Gothic style, the gargoyles are carved of Indiana limestone. 'Are they going to be real, or are they going to be stone?' he quizzed her during their drive.

Six-year-old Shawn Harvey of Sterling agreed to take the tour only after his mom convinced him that gargoyles don't come alive at night. Bring binoculars, because after a brief lecture and slide show you'll traipse outside to spot the carved characters. You can get a close look at many of the cathedral's congenial or creepy critters on a gargoyle tour. But, without a driving rainstorm, the gargoyles merely dribble. Like their older European counterparts, the Washington National Cathedral gargoyles are designed to channel rainwater off the cathedral's 11/2-acre roof and away from its stone walls to prevent erosion and staining. Even longtime volunteers at Washington National Cathedral admit they've never seen it. IT'S HARD to catch a gargoyle on the job.

Download gothic cathedral gargoyles