The final leg of our recent vacation was a trip back through Ohio.
This time we stayed in Cincinnati. We started at the Cleveland Botanical Gardens. The parking was $12 for the first hour … with both the good and bad news being that an hour is really all you need for the garden. It was one of the smallest botanical garden I have visited to date.
We started inside a climate controlled dome. I was never quick enough to capture a phote of a butterfly, but I did get a photo of this little cutie.
In the gardens themselves, I thought this archway was unique.
And there were quite a few flowers in bloom and a healthy dose of Bees doing what bees do.
And I managed to get a decent selfie (I wanted to see what surrounding myself with green would do to my Hazel eyes.
Next stop was a must-do restaurant I had on my list – Larder Delicatesson & Bakery – and it did not disappoint.
We shared the Schnitzel plate and the Adult Lunchable. The Schnitzel, cabbage and potato salad were all sooooo good. I think I might have actually licked-up the last little bit of that creamy mustard sauce. And as was apparently the theme in this last part of the trip, the menu was posted on a chalk board.
The owner came over and told us about the different items and about his travels (he has lectured on his Koji Alchemy Fermentation methods at the University of Iowa).
Those rye crackers were so good. There was some of the saltiest and delicious cavier I’ve ever had with the perfect. And I usually don’t like anything cold with tomato, but the bloody mary pickeled celery was so yummy. And the bottom mold-covered “meat” was actually carrot that was cured using his Koji Alchemy method … it was smoky and I never would have known it was carrow if he hadn’t told me.
And the desserts were so good, I had to get one of each to take with me … and then I wished I had one more of each.
The next day, we walked over to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, so we were there when it opened. And you know if there’s a photo booth, we’ve got to go inside. I thought it would project us onto some Rock & Roll background, but instead it just got a memor of two goofy kids having an awesome vacation (but the super-nice part was the digital picture was free).
The main exhibit was Saturday Night Live: 50 years of music, which was so cool. The movie about musical guests including Justin Timberlake talking about Beyonce and the Single Ladies sketch had me laughing all over again.
My sister and I have laughed (and possibly reenacted) Kristen Wiig’s Dooneese sketch so many times, and I loved seeing the original dress.
Also, given the apparent theme of our trip, there was a Paul McCartney exhibit. I also loved the Revolutionary Women in Music Exhibit, which had my favorite piece … an outfit created & worn by Lady Gaga (created with her sister). I loved that the entire piece was covered in hand-written song lyrics with typewriter key/parts embellishments. I now have my eyes on looking at the thrift store for a jacket I could play with.
Here’s another view (things were so hard to photograph since everything was in reflective cases). I love the differennt colors of ink, diffferent handwriting, and slightly different colors of neutral.
I also loved seeing the amazing outfit worn by Chappell Roan when she indicated Cindy Lauper to the Hall of Fame.
We also went to the International Women’s Air & Space Museum, which was small very very interesting (if you’re ever looking for it, it’s inside the small airport on the lake). It was fun reading about the Wright Brothers’ sister Katharine Wright (how had I never heard of her), as well as so many female pioneers who wanted to fly including amazing astronauts.
We stopped for lunch at Nuevo Modern Mexican and Tequila Bar for Chips, Guacamole, Margaritas (of course) and a few appetizers. They were having “big issues” so we couldn’t dine outside by the lake, but we could still see it out the window.
The next day, we headed to Northbrook, Illinois (north of Chicago). The company I work for has an office there, so I’ve been several times, but I never had any time to explore places I had seen. I finally got to go to Mariano’s Grocery Store and pick-up several local goodies (I love visiting grocery stores when we travel, but I’ve hear Biz talk about Mariano’s so much, I felt like I already knew it).
We had supper at Francesco’s Hole in the Wall (another restaurant with a handwritten menu on the wall). Rod had the Rigatoni with Sausage, which he finished completely.
I had Lasagnetta with Seafood, which I thought was going to be a small lasagna … turns out they were instead skinny little lasagna shaped noodes with lots of big pieces of seafood, which were so good.
We also had their house made butter cake with spumoni ice cream, but I dug in before the ice cream melted on the warm cake, so we didn’t get a pretty picture (but seriously, have the butter cake).
All-in-all it was a pretty wonderful trip, and we certainly see road trips in our future.