Cleveland the birthplace of Rock and Roll

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Woke up early the next day and since Danielle was still asleep I went out myself and did some exploring of the building. The rooftop terrace had a nice view of Cleveland and I reminded myself to go up later that evening to see the buildings lit up. I wandered around the neighborhood looking for some place to get some breakfast. As it turns out the famous West Side market was a block away from the hostel.

I sat down for breakfast at the West Side Café which got all their ingredients from the neighboring market. Most of the breakfast was fairly standard eggs, toast, and potatoes but I will say the bacon they had was incredible. I wanted to get some bacon to bring home but it would be hard to keep it fresh on the long drive home. I tipped the waitress generously for the great meal and went into the market to take a look around. The market itself is a food market so had every kind of meat you can imagine. Most of it was fresh and I was tempted to buy some food to bring home.

I got back to the hostel and got ready for the day. Shortly after 9AM Danielle and I were all ready to face Cleveland. At this point we had not met any hostel employees yet and I will say that is unusual for a hostel. We grabbed some brochures from the front desk and coupons for the Rock and Roll hall of fame which would be our first stop.

GPS was handy to get around but even with it I ended missing some exits and turns but we got to where we wanted to go. The Rock and Roll hall of fame had glass pyramids out front and it reminded me a lot of the Louvre museum in Paris. Price was ok at $20 and the place did have a lot of exhibits spread across 6 floors. I found out why Cleveland got to host the museum instead of larger cities such as Chicago or New York City. As it turns out the term Rock and Roll was first coined by a Cleveland DJ and maybe the bigger reason is that they paid $65 million dollars to the construction and setup of the building. I will say it was a good investment because it was busy with a good sized crowd of tourists wandering through the building.

The museum went through every era of rock and roll and had memorabilia from every conceivable rock and roll star from Madonna to Ray Charles and all the way up to modern times. There were even some small theatres showing videos of highlights from previous decades. On the top 2 floor there was the Rolling Stone special exhibit. I knew they had a colorful history but the exhibit had a lot of the details. I was surprised the 2 times they were facing prison time for drug use and both times they were pardoned after promising to do charity concerts. One of the best lines was that "You Don't Break a Butterfly on the Wheel". I thought that was a good line because Rolling Stones are artists.

It was good start to the day and we stayed for almost 3 hours before heading out. On our way back to the car we stopped to take some pictures of the nearby harbor which had an actual world war 2 era submarine moored there. The USS COD has sat their for 50 years and I guess it is a tourist draw.

Danielle wanted to do some shopping so we drove to Tower city and went into the mall. We ate some lunch in the cafeteria and I had heard good things about the chili so I ordered some pizza and chili. I will say the pizza was not that good and the chili was both cold and really uninspiring. I am probably judging too harsh because it was just a small cafeteria so I couldn't really expect that much. We did notice that the McDonald's was serving 20 chicken nuggets for $5 which is a fraction of the price in Canada.

Danielle and I wandered around various stores and she was tempted by some very nice looking shoes (Pictured) which were a great price. We ended up leaving the mall not really buying anything of significance and went looking for the Christmas Story house. I have been a fan of the movie since I watched it in the early 90's. We drove down there and it is in a kind of a run down neighborhood but was crowded with cars driven by tourists. We paid $5 for a parking spot in some guy's back yard. There were 3 houses you can visit, the first one is the gift shop where you buy tickets, the museum which contained various items from the movie and the house itself. I bought a keychain in the shape of the famous leg lamp from the movie.

Tickets for the house were $10 a piece and gave you free run of the house for about 30 minutes once you heard the history of the movie and the house. The movie was made by the same person who created the Porky's movies. Apparently he got the money to make movie because he agreed to make the sequel to Porky. The Christmas Story house was rescued from destruction by a fan of the movie in 2006 and he paid $150 000 for it and spent another $250 000 to renovate it to the exact look of the movie. Danielle had asked if the presence of the house increased property values. Apparently the recession had hit Cleveland hard and the houses around the area were going for only $20 000 and the neighbors hated all the traffic that came in because of it.

The house was well designed and it looked exactly like the movie. We got to pose with the famous red rider BB gun. Some children were going under the sink and after some hesitation both Danielle and I found out we both can fit underneath the sink so I guess we are not all grown up 😊.

After that we headed back to the hostel and after a quick nap we went out to dinner. Not far from our building there are a good collection of restaurants and bars. We ended up eating a Mexican place where we ate some soup, tortillas and a very tasty pork chop. I don't know why I chose the pork chop but I am glad I did because it was so wonderfully made. During our meal Danielle and I engaged in a spirited debate about ethics. That is one of the things I most like about Danielle she is a good debater and is fun to argue with.

We had done a lot of grocery shopping (mostly Danielle) that day and we were impressed by both the prices and the variety of products available in the supermarket. The one thing Danielle was missing was some gift boxes of liquor. We got some directions from the waitress and drove downtown to a liquor store. Unlike Canada the USA has a lot of small liquor stores while we only have the LCBO. After some difficulty finding a parking spot downtown Danielle managed to get some very nice gift boxes of liquor at a good price.

We got back to the hostel and went inside and we still had not seen anyone at the front desk of the hostel. I was starting to wonder if the hostel ran on auto pilot. We grabbed some snacks and went up to the rooftop terrace and sat down taking pictures and looking over at the city scape. It was a nice view and I am glad that Danielle suggested the city.

We went to sleep at that point but with some difficulty as a group of Germans were still talking loudly on rooftop. Oh well I have slept through worse than that at a hostel.

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Photos

Cupboard under the sink
I fit

Shoes
Danielle and one of the pairs of shoes she wanted to buy.