Older kids will love Cleveland
For our family, spring break 2009 encompassed Easter and two birthdays, so celebrations with relatives came first, leaving us limited travel time.
The question became where can two adults and two boys ages 10 and 12 travel that’s away, but not too far, and still offers several days worth of fun? I’ll give you a hint: It may not be balmy in April, but it is on water and it ROCKS!
Yes, as Drew Carey says, Cleveland rocks! Since one son plays “Guitar Hero,” and the other actually plays guitar, The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum was a big draw for them, and for their music-loving parents.
First-rate accommodations
Thanks to the Web sites TripAdvisor and Priceline, we booked a room in a luxury downtown hotel for less than we would have paid at a Bates-like motel.
The Renaissance Cleveland Hotel is a renovated historical four-star beauty. Our spacious room overlooked the Public Square and was on the same floor as the pool/atrium, which the kids utilized each evening.
The hotel is connected to the Tower City Center mall, so we were just an indoor stroll from shopping, a movie theater, cheap food-court eats, and a pricy but fun meal at the Hard Rock Café.
Using another tip from TripAdvisor, we parked in the lot next to the hotel, saving half the cost of parking in the hotel’s lot. From then on we rode the city’s free Red Line downtown trolley everywhere we wanted to go.
Grand downtown
Downtown Cleveland has undergone a major transformation in recent years. In addition to the Rock Hall, as the locals call it, which opened in 1995, it is also home to Cleveland Browns Stadium, Cleveland Indians baseball at Progressive Field and Quicken Loans Arena, which was buzzing with the excitement of a late-season Cavaliers game.
On that same night, House of Blues Cleveland hosted a sold-out show by Hall of Fame inductee Jeff Beck.
I’d recommend travelers without kids check out their entertainment schedule or have dinner at this 61,000-square foot renovated Woolworth’s department store
building.
(Speaking of department stores, the Higbee’s building, made famous in “A Christmas Story,” is also on the Public Square. Sadly, it closed in 2002.)
The Rock Hall
At the Hall of Fame we spent seven hours immersed in music history. Information is dispensed through multimedia presentations, interactive kiosks, photos and artifact displays. The history of rock is broken down by decade, by region and by influence.
It covers people who made music, influenced music and worked behind the scenes. The film that introduces each inductee was well worth the time, and our visit was made especially memorable by a security guard named Robert who took the time to share his insider knowledge and brushes with fame.
Yes, celebrities, even inductees, occasionally walk in off the street to look around inside this dramatic geometric building on the shores of Lake Erie.
More attractions
While nothing could top our day at the Rock Hall, its neighbor, the Great Lakes Science Museum, was enjoyable too. If you’ve ever been to a “hands-on” science museum, you know what to expect: lots of kids running around, pushing buttons and making strange noises all in the name of scientific learning.
The GLSM includes an Omnimax theater and more than 400 exhibits, including those in the popular Science Phenomena area.
Other family-friendly attractions in Cleveland include Metropark Zoo, which claims to have the largest collection of primates in the U.S., and the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, home to numerous dinosaur bones and “Lucy,” one of the oldest skeletons of humanity’s early ancestors.
Judy Kneiszel is a freelance writer from De Pere.