Cleveland Rocks!

June 16: We woke up rested and ready for breakfast -- so did everyone else at the downtown Cleveand Comfort Inn -- holy cow, this place is packed! At the little lobby restaurant you can cook your own waffles or toast english muffins or bagels, slurp yogurt or cereal and have all the juice and fruit you desire. Perfect for my little men's tummies. It's crowded -- I wonder if people walk in off the street to eat breakfast here?

We're off to the Great Lakes Science Center. Paul google mapped the directions from the hotel, I applied sunscreen, and off we go. I discover that we're in the Theater District. Very cool! There are theaters after theaters after theaters here, and lots of cool shops and restaurants. It's a beautiful sunny day. We walk, and walk, and walk. I am grateful we have a stroller. We leave uptown and walk through downtown. Not such a nice neighborhood. Glad it's day time. We go and go. Google Maps was not so accurate on distance, surprise (NOT).

Past where the Browns play football and downtown folk go to partake in Cleveland amenities......The first "Are we there yet?" was from ME!!

We arrived at the science center -- 15 minutes before they opened -- am I just lucky or what?
We goofed around in the foyer/atrium, plenty of stuff to do for 15 minutes -- then bought our tix to go in. 9.50 for adults and 7.50 for kids 2-7. Zac was free.

First destination: The polymer playroom, an area for children aged 1-7. Kids with comprehension could learn about polymers, but the rest of us jumped in the bouncy house, rolled in the ball pit and marveled at balls floating in the air and objects moving by water power. There's and indoor and an outdoor area to play in and we had both all to ourselves. Also, this place has free, clean socks to borrow instead of charging money for them like the other museum did.

At this museum we also: made our hair stand up with an electrostatic charge, tested our stability on balance boards, built things with plastic gears, traced shapes of the Great Lakes, learned what makes bubbles so bubbly, explored the states of matter (liquid, solid, gas) and gazed out at Lake Erie. We stayed for five hours! At $26.50, it was a bargain. We decided to forgo the Children's Museum of Cleveland, as we had all we needed at the Science Center. We ate lunch in the restaurant there, and Zac took a nap in his stroller.

We also enjoyed the walk to and from the Science Center, which gave us an opportunity to see downtown and uptown Cleveland. It's a big city for us Vermonters, and a real change of pace. Along with the big tall buildings and cool statues, there is a lot of green space in parks and outdoor malls. We played in some metal ball sculptures for a while and practiced our air guitar skills on a giant guitar mounted near a bus stop. After all, Cleveland Rocks!