Cleveland – RJsCorner

Introducing Augmented Realities

May 7, 2019June 18, 2019RJ Walters

Augmented Realitiesis a new category for me here at RJsCorner. It is meant to allow my creative side a little more leeway in my life. Most of the posts in this category will be where I take some of my favorite photos and expose them to artistic apps to turn them into “art”. Of course art is in the eye of the beholder, so I will wait for your judgement on whether I am doing a good job.

The first installment is a picture of me taken at a cafe attached to the Westside Market in Cleveland. It was taken last year during our trip to see Punxsutawney Phil. A full post on that soon. 🙂

An enjoyable breakfast in a small Cleveland cafe.

Cleveland – A Different View

November 13, 2018May 4, 2019RJ Walters

Last Saturday’s “Artsy” post gave you a snapshot of our trip to Cleveland earlier this year. This post will put some flesh on those bones. 🙂

Our first extended visit to Cleveland was in 2013. We were visiting a couple of my high school classmates of fifty years ago. We took in the downtown area and most of the usual tourist places during that trip. The trip this Spring was a two-day pass-through one and I was determined to see a different view of the city. As mentioned Saturday, we stayed at the Aloft Hotel on the Cuyahoga River a short distance from Lake Erie. It was a very different place than we usually stay and that is exactly what I was hoping for. Since I didn’t get any internal shots of the hotel I took some from their website, I’m sure they won’t mind the free advertising. (Oh, by the way, click on any of these groups of pictures to see larger and captioned versions.)

The backside of the hotel where our room was was literally abutted up to the commuter train tracks. The views were amazing. This is a slideshow of my pictures.

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As you likely know, I am a planner so I had checked out the Westside Market as the place to go for the next day which was a Tuesday. We got to the market plenty early so there wouldn’t be too many people but found out they are closed on Tuesday! We did eat at the local cafe attached to the market and had a humongous breakfast. Finally here are some pictures of that.

This place has been around forever

I sneaked a picture through the cafe door glass

Sorry I missed you

Me, having a pleasant time waiting for breakfast

My Hubby of 33 years seemed to be enjoying herself

It was an enjoyable experience, even if we were disappointed about the market. From Cleveland, we went to Punxsutawney PA to see Phil. More on that in a future Tuesday post.

Coastal Taco – Cleveland

November 10, 2018May 4, 2019RJ Walters

Coastal Taco - Cleveland

For the first “Artsy Saturday” post at the reformatted RJsCorner, I chose the Coastal Taco in downtown Cleveland Ohio. The picture was taken just after sunset from our room at the very eclectic Aloft Hotel. As you can see the restaurant was under a very large bridge going across the Cuyahoga River near Lake Erie. The food was pretty good and the inside atmosphere was delicious. 🙂

Cleveland Treasures

February 3, 2018May 4, 2019RJ Walters

For this Artsy Saturday, I wanted to give you some pictures that I see as the quintessential Cleveland. I am not a sports nut by any stretch of the imagination so their well-known teams just aren’t “Cleveland” to me. The Cleveland Clinic is a crown jewel for the city but I will talk about that in a future post.

When I visited the city a few years ago I discovered that it has a much more diverse population then I imagine. Part of that is ethnic neighborhoods. The restaurant sign below is in the Italian district.

The city center includes the Terminal Tower constructed in 1926. These fantastic windows are located there.

Some cities “modernize” and throw away these types of things. Cleveland rightfully celebrates them.

Cleveland Cleveland-2

Emporiums….

November 18, 2014RJ Walters

Cleveland, OH – Emporium

This emporium in downtown Cleveland while pretty much vacant now was once a vital part of the city. These were the first shopping malls in America. Like this one they are pretty much abandoned now because everyone now goes to the modern ones in the suburbs.

American Food…

September 25, 2014RJ Walters

Cleveland, OH – Guarinos

I know the hot dog is supposedly very American but I kind of think our food, like our population, is a melting pot of different ethnic varieties. In reality I don’t think of our population so much as a melting pot but as a stew; maybe I should think that way about the food also? Any large city has at least a dozen different nationalities restaurants in their environs. My favorites have always been Chinese and Mexican. I do like a hot dog now and then but the flavors from many ethnic foods pulls me in.

Amish in Berlin OH…

April 9, 2013March 3, 2017RJ Walters

Here we are in the final hotel of our Cleveland vacation. We are in Newark Ohio which is a little east of Columbus. We spent much of the day in more Amish country of Berlin Ohio. It claims to have the largest Amish community in the U.S. I bought a couple of framed pictures as mementos of our trip. When we left this area to head south to I70 we found you couldn’t get there from here. Two of the three roads we tried were closed!

Finally after three failed attempts we managed to find our way south and will jump on I 70 tomorrow morning for the trip home. It was a good vacation; we certainly enjoyed the cultural aspects of it and the visit with my high school friends. We learned quite a bit about Cleveland that we didn’t know before. When we visited the historical society building yesterday we came to understand that it is critical to say you are from east Cleveland or west Cleveland, not just Cleveland. We learned that there is much ethnic diversity in Cleveland than we thought. We learned that you can’t get there from here when traveling south out of northeast Ohio.

It was an interesting vacation. We will likely be back sometime soon for another visit to our re-found friends. But the next time we will find an easier way to get from there back home 🙂 Tomorrow I will be getting back to my usual posting about life in general…It was nice to be away but it will also be nice to get back; even for that mountain of Spring chores waiting for me…

On The Road Cleveland – Day 8, The Final Run…

April 9, 2013May 4, 2019RJ Walters

One The Road Cleveland – Day 6 Gallery..

April 7, 2013May 4, 2019RJ Walters

Here we are sitting in our hotel room on Sunday morning waiting for the museum to open at noon. So, I thought I would pull a few more pictures out of the album to show here. We are headed for the Western Reserve Historical Society today to get a more detailed account of local history. Then it will be off to our friends home for a few days. I’m not sure how technology conscious my friend is so I don’t know if I can get on the internet while we are there. If not, this will be a last post for a couple of days.

I am just going to give you several pictures here we have taken over the last five days. If you want an explanation of any of them leave a comment. 🙂 Well maybe I do need to explain the first one. It is of a sewer cover! My wife is from Neenah Wisconsin so whenever we travel we are always looking down as well as up so we notice the Neenah Foundry art. It is surprising how many states we have come across these iron monoliths.

Cleveland Gallery..

April 7, 2013March 3, 2017RJ Walters

On The Road Cleveland – Day 4 Museums

April 5, 2013May 4, 2019RJ Walters

We spent today with some old-time high school friends of mine who are near-Cleveland residents. We spent the majority of the day at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History but before that we got a thorough driving tour of the Cleveland Clinic. The scale of the clinic is almost unimaginable. There were at least twenty huge buildings in the complex. The Cleveland Clinic is thought to be the healthcare of the future in that they do it much more efficiently than most. All their doctors are on salary as opposed to independent practices. Surgeons don’t make money performing more surgeries; they make a salary to find and relieve healthcare problems. The entire complex is very automated and geared toward wellness instead of profits. I do believe that the Cleveland Clinic along with the Mayo Clinic will be how medicine is done when we finally get over our obsession with our current healthcare systems in this country.

The Museum of Natural History was one of the finest ones we have visited. It had a very diverse amount of different things. I seem to be a rock-hound so I spent quite a bit of time in that area and learned several different facts that I had not previously heard. Another part of the museum that fascinated me was the Mayan exhibit. I did not realize that they had such an elaborate means of recording their history. Their hieroglyphics are very elaborate. I need to study on that some more. The museum shop didn’t have anything on it so I will hit Amazon as soon as get home. I think I would like to be more studied on it.

One thing I learned both yesterday and today is that this is Spring break for the Cleveland area. I can’t tell you how many shin bumps I have from being hit by baby carriages in the last two days. Maybe it is a good thing that we are childless as I just don’t seem to have much patience for all the kids running around frantically at these sort of places.

We finished up our tour of the museum with a planetarium show. It was an elaborate demonstration of the mars probe as well as showing us all the constellations in the heavens. I still think it is kind of a stretch how they name some of them. They just don’t look like lions and bears and such to me. But it was a very impressive show. I remember hiking up to the top of a mountain in Colorado in my much younger days and see all those stars they showed us today but I has been years since I saw a sky so studded with stars.

After the museum it was off to Little Italy for a late lunch at a one-hundred year old establishment and then some cannoli at a bakery of like age. Both were fantastic. Tomorrow will sort of be an R&R day for us. We have walked about ten miles in the last few days and need a little rest. The day will probably be spent at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and dinner at a place along the lake. But, of course more on that later…

Cleveland Museum of Natural History

April 5, 2013RJ Walters

Cleveland Zoo

April 4, 2013RJ Walters

We are now situated in our home for the next three days. It is in a DoubleTree Hampton on the 15th floor overlooking Lake Erie. It will be nice not having to pack for the next few days. Nice views from the 15th floor. We spent the day at the Cleveland Zoo and Rainforest. It was an interesting time. Of course photos are attached here. The Rainforest was pretty nice; lots of beautiful flowers and such. The Zoo was pretty good but not up to par with our hometown one in Indianapolis.

We will be spending much of the day tomorrow with some high school friends who are giving us the royal tour of the city. They both graduated from colleges here after attending our alma mater high school in Indiana and have been living here for 30+ years. I have seen them a few time but this will be the most time we have spent together since we were classmates almost fifty years ago.

When we left the zoo for the hotel in downtown Cleveland I punched the name of the hotel into my iPad mapping program and it set up a route for me. Unfortunately it was the wrong location. I didn’t discover it until we were more than ten miles beyond where we needed to be. You gotta keep an eye on these gps programs 🙂

I am spending the evening trying to come up with a restaurant for our anniversary dinner on Saturday. Since my wife and I have such differing tastes it proves difficult. We were going to try the Lola which is owned by the famous chef Bobby Simone but the menu wasn’t compatible with my wife’s tastes or our budget and it was already filled for the entire weekend. So I am still on looking for one.

Tomorrow we will likely see the Cleveland Clinic along with many sites in the University Circle area. More on that tomorrow.

On The Road Cleveland – Day 3 Zoo

April 4, 2013May 4, 2019RJ Walters

Tomorrow we will likely see the Cleveland Clinic along with many sites in the University Circle area. More on that tomorrow.

On The Road Cleveland – Day 2 Youngstown

April 3, 2013May 4, 2019RJ Walters

As noted in yesterday’s post we spent the day at Youngstown. It was everything I expected it to be. The Youngstown Historical Center was of course all about steel. I took about forty pictures of the exhibits and will give you a few of them here. I didn’t realize that there were actually seven mills running here during their heydays in the 1960’s. They started shutting down after the Japanese started flooding the market with sub-cost steels in the early 1980s and Ronald Reagan didn’t do anything to stop them. As a result they disappeared very quickly along with thousands of good paying middle class jobs.

There is little there now of any of the big buildings. About all that is left is the soot they produced. Youngstown is a dirty town similar to Pittsburgh but there are signs of life with new business. But never enough to keep the blighted neighborhoods in the background.

When we are in areas like this we try to visit the local food establishments. I got on Yelp and found a few good ones but of the three I had chosen all were closed. One appeared to be open on weekends only. We finally did find a really nice italian delicatessen. The help there was very patient we my wife and her picky diet.

There is another thing that surprised me about the Cleveland area and that is just how diversified it is. There are many different ethnic restaurants and such around. But when I got to studying the exhibits in the historical center I remembered that many people throughout Europe and Russia immigrated to work in the mills.

After the historic center we had enough time to also visit the Butler Institute of American Art. It was a first-class place and totally dedicated to American artists. Homer Winslow was one of the most celebrated ones there. Of course no photos in the museum so no pictures to show of that.

The temperatures continue to be in the 30s today but they say it will be in the 50s tomorrow. I certainly hope so as we plan to visit the Cleveland Zoo and particularly the rainforest area. It is supposed to be world-class. More on that tomorrow.

Youngstown

April 3, 2013RJ Walters

On The Road, Cleveland — Day 1

April 2, 2013May 4, 2019RJ Walters

Yes, we decided to visit the Cleveland Ohio area for our April vacation this year. As expected we spent most of the day in the car. I don’t know why even after 27 years this Friday of being married I haven’t learned to lie about the time I want to leave. I told Yvonne we need to be on the road at 9:00am so of course as usually it was about 9:30am before we left. Why didn’t I say 8:30?

We took almost all interstate roads to get here to Macedonia Ohio. After seven hours on the road the most significant thing I can say about our trip is that almost all the roads we took were in serious need of repair; there were bumps and potholes everywhere. I heard we are about number 18 in the world and rapidly dropping in maintaining our infrastructure and I can believe that after today. If we don’t spend some taxes on them soon they will be gravel roads again like they were 100+ years ago.

Tomorrow we will be visiting a historical center in Youngstown Ohio. For those kids out there Youngstown was famous for its steel mills in the 1960s. About the only thing still there are the skeletons and history places. I have never visited this area of Ohio before so I didn’t see it in its glory but I do remember hearing about the Cuyhoga River catching on fire in the last 60s. That proved to be the turning point for our finally seriously attacking air and water pollution in this country. We will be going over that river tomorrow. I’m sure it will looking nothing like what it did back then. I wonder what similar event will finally trigger our seriousness toward global warming?

I can’t believe the difference between today and a year ago when we were on the road. Last year it was in the 70s and 80s and farmers were out in groves plowing and disking. Today in never got out of the 30s.

We will spend a couple of days around the outskirts of the city and then move into our fancy hotel in the downtown area for our anniversary weekend. I hear the Cleveland Zoo has a rather elaborate rainforest area. We are hoping to see that maybe on Thursday. More on that in tomorrow’s post.