Day 23 - Even TripAdvisor Thinks Cleveland's #1 Attraction Is The Cleveland Museum Of Art

---

---

The weather forecast this morning for both Columbus and Cleveland was bright and sunny with no chance of rain. There also wasn't any wind. Temperatures started at a cool 77 degrees and rose to a balmy 84. It was the perfect day to ride. And after a quick breakfast in Columbus that's just what we did. I set the Garmin to avoid highways, and for the almost 4 hour ride from Columbus to Cleveland, it was just 2 lane country roads all the way. Small town after small town passed by with very little traffic along the way. After yesterdays 4-lane highways and grooved pavement interstates, it was just the relaxing ride we needed. We're planning on spending 2 nights in Cleveland, and our hotel is withing walking distance of the Rock 'N Roll Hall of Fame, so we will wait until tomorrow to visit it.

We did get a bit of a late start out of Columbus as those Doubletree beds are super comfortable. So we arrived at the Cleveland Museum of Art at about 12:30. We looked around for parking, and there was on-street parking right in front of the entrance for 75 cents per hour. The plan was to spend a couple of hours at the art museum and then walk over to the air-car museum a couple of blocks away. So we gathered up all our change and filled the meter with 3 hours and 40 minutes. That should give us plenty of time.

The interesting thing about the Cleveland Museum of Art is that admission is free. If there are any special exhibits, they may have a charge, but the permanent collection is totally free. They were having a special exhibit by Alex Katz, but we looked at examples of his work, and neither of us were particularly interested. The museum is quite a bit larger than we expected and the building is beautiful. It is 2 stories and laid out as a huge square with a covered atrium in the center. The atrium is mostly open, with a few pieces of sculpture and some seating for the cafe, it is used mostly as a gathering area for events. There is a basement area with a couple of small exhibition galleries and a bunch of classrooms, but we never made it down to that level.

We started on the first level with some of the ancient near eastern, Greek and Roman along with a large section of ancient Egypt. A lot of these artifacts were incredibly old, dating back to 2000 to 4000 BC. Just some really incredible stuff. Then we headed into some of the more common Medieval and Renaissance pieces. They also had some interesting Islamic pieces. Tucked away in the front were a couple of focus galleries that contained some modern abstract prints that we both liked. At this point, we realized it was going to take a little more than a couple of hours, so we decided to take a break and get a little snack at the cafe. A couple of homemade fancy cupcakes and coffee hit the spot and we were ready to head back out.

First stop on the 2nd level was Indian and Southeast Asian section. Mostly sculpture, Jody especially likes the Indian artwork. These also included Tibetan and Himalayan artworks. From there the Asian artwork expanded to Chinese, Japanese, even Korean, before we moved into the ancient South and Central Americas and Native American art. Just when we were getting a little tired of all the ancient artwork, we walked into a room with a sculpture of a huge tube of toothpaste on the floor and new we had arrived to the Contemporary and Modern section. These are always our favorites as some of the artwork can be truly bizarre, but it's always interesting to see creativity and imagination in action.

Beyond that were the impressionists and they had a very good sampling of artists like Van Gogh, Picasso, Renoir, Monet, Matisse, Degas and many more. By this time we were getting concerned with the time as it was getting close to 4:00 and we weren't sure how much time was left on the meter. So we rushed through the last section, which is really more the Classical and Neoclassical, both British and American. Most of these are portraits or landscapes, neither of which are our particular favorites, though we did slow down in the Faberge section where they did have a number of small collectables and even a real Faberge egg.

We made a quick stop at the gift shop, but there were no good t-shirts, so we headed back out to the bike and found we still had 27 minutes left on the meter. We were only about 6 miles from the hotel, so we decided we were done for the day and headed over to the hotel. This is a downtown hotel, so even though we got a great rate - thanks Maureen!, parking is $18 per day. So we pulled up in front of the entrance and there was an open spot with a parking meter right in front. We unloaded the bike and headed inside. When I asked the girl at the counter what to do about parking my motorcycle, she asked where I was now, and when I showed her out the front widow, she told us we were in luck. It was 4:30 and at 5:00 the meters are done for the weekend and all parking downtown after 5:00 on Friday is free until Monday morning. So I went back outside and added a couple of quarters to get us past 5:00 and we should be good until we leave Sunday morning and save the $18 per day. The Rock 'N Roll Hall of fame is within walking distance as are most things downtown, so the bike is parked until Sunday.

For dinner we headed down the block to the Winking Lizard Tavern. The food was pretty good, but it is located at the entrance to a once beautiful dead mall. It's all glass and called the Galleria, but the store directory inside is really sad with just a couple of consignment shops and a couple of Food Court entries. After dinner we were able to stop at the CVS across the street and pick up a few supplies. We probably need to stop at a Post Office and ship some stuff back, but the downtown post offices are closed on Saturday, so we will have to wait until Akron. Speaking of Akron, we were planning on riding the Cuyahoga Scenic Railway on Sunday morning through Cuyahoga National Park. Of course, since we are traveling, we tend to lose track of the days and almost forgot that Sunday is Father's Day. So I checked for train tickets for the Sunday 9:00AM ride, and sure enough there is a Father's Day breakfast special that is already sold out, but the Sunday morning continental breakfast is still available. So I ordered tickets online for will call before the continental breakfast is sold out also.

171.2 Miles Today

3803.6 Miles Total

4.882 Gallons Today

95.618 Gallons Total

---