Indianapolis Children's Museum and downtown Indianapolis

After an exciting morning at Indianapolis Motor Speeedway, we headed towards Indianapolis Children's Museum, in the hope of finding some luck en route.  We didn't.  The museum has nothing other than residential areas around it.  We bit the bullet and decided to have lunch in there.

We must have got there about noon.  The queue for tickets was horrendous!!!!  We waited about 25 minutes for tickets.  Not cheap either (only kids under 2 get in free)  particularly as we wanted to see the Tera Cotta Warriors, which was an extra charge $10 each for Paul and I, and an extra $5 for all 3 boys.  

We ate lunch in the cafeteria, pizza all round.  It wasn't too bad, and there were plenty of seats, even though it was busy.

As they have the Terra Cotta warriors visiting, there were a lot of exhibits based around China

Our boys had great fun dressing up in traditional Chinese costumes, and they liked the exhibits about the culture

We had a set time on our tickets for the Terra Cotta warriors, so we looked at other exhibits in the mean time.  When it was our time, we headed into the exhibit.  I remember when these guys came to the Natural History Museum in London.  My dad went to see them, he said it was amazing.

He was right.  The boys weren't that interested, but Paul and I could have spent a good chunk of time looking at them.

The boys were more interested in the interactive parts of the exhibit, luckily there were quite a few of them.  Here they are making warriors out of clay, and adding them to the army.  It wasn't easy 

Such amazing armor 

The boys even tried on some replica.  Isaac has the right staunch face for it

Once we had seen the Terra Cotta warriors, we headed to the top floor, and made our way down.  The boys had great fun having a tea party with the bears in the carousel wishes and dreams area.  I think we did pretty much every exhibit (other than sitting in a race car, seeing as thats what they had done that morning!) .

They also really enjoyed sliding down the Great Wall of China slide (a staircase they had converted).  I was lucky enough to sit this one out...

We then headed into the basement level, where there were more interesting exhibits.  The boys had great fun digging for dinosaur bones, and checking out the lab they have there.

Seb enjoyed being able to interact in the dinosaurs environment. 

We then headed to the All aboard! Area, which had many different trains to look at.  The train below is called the Reuben Wells, an actual stem train that was used to pouch carriages up a steep incline in Madison Hills, Indiana.  The museum acquired it in the 1960's and it is now a permanent fixture at the museum.

After exploring the last few areas of the museum, we headed out, just before closing time, pausing to take some photos of Bumblebee on the way.

If you are in Indianapolis, the Children's Museum is definitely worth a visit.  There is plenty there for the kids to do, and even adults would enjoy it.

We decided to head into the city centre for dinner that evening.  We were lucky enough to be able to walk it, and the streets were pretty quiet.

I wanted to see the Soldier Sailor Monument in the centre.  

It's original purpose was to honor Hoosiers who were veterans of the American Civil War, but it is also a tribute to those who fought in the American Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Spanish-American War and the Mexican-American War (thats a lot of wars….)

The monument is only 15ft shorter than the Statue of Liberty.

After a quick walk around, we headed for some dinner.  We had spotted the Rock Bottom Brewery on our way to the monument, so decided to give it a go.  The boys were all pleased to be able to get diet dew to drink! Paul went with the Kolsch beer, and I had the RB White Ale.  We have certainly got into our different beers/ales since we have lived there.  I decided on the Laredo burger, a south west inspired burger (I am a sucker for guacamole on anything!) and Paul decided on the Bourbonzola burger, think the bourbon glaze swayed him… Isaac and Seb ordered the grilled cheese sandwiches, but Oliver wanted something else.  He decided on a make your own pizza.  He had great fun when the server bought him his board, and he was able to make his dinner from scratch.   

It took a bit of a while for the food to come, but they were quite busy.  When it arrived, it was delicious.  Empty plates from all of us.  The place had  nice atmosphere and were very welcoming to kids, even with us leaving about 8pm!

We headed back to the hotel, and had a quick swim in the pool.  Slight problem with the pool was the pool sides.  They were very slippery when wet, not great with small children.  After a couple of falls we headed back to the room, tired and ready for a day on the road the next day.  

Time to start heading home…..

Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Anyone who knew me in England knew that as a family we are car mad.  That has only escalated since moving stateside.  When I was planning this trip we decided we had to go to Indianapolis to see the track.  I looked in to it in advance, and booked us on a tour.  

We arrived at the track about 9.15.  It's kinda weird, cos the main road is right next to the grandstand, then you drive under the track to get to the museum in the middle

I was glad I has reserved us on the tour, as the place was busy.  

We had a quick walk around the museum before jumping on a full tour bus.

The first thing we did was drive the circuit at a speedy 45mph!!!!  The tour guide was giving a running commentary, very educational.  First stop was the famous brick finishing line.  Bricks replaced the original surface of crushed rock and tar in 1909, but asphalt had covered all but the yard of bricks at the start finish straight by 1961.  The finish line is one of the only parts of brick remaining. NASCAR champion Dale Jarrett began the tradition of kidding this bricks in 1996.  This continues to this day with Indy and NASCAR drivers kissing the bricks if they win.

The other people on the tour were very nice, and were snapping pictures for each other.

The pagoda is an iconic building at Indy, and has been there in some shape or form since 1913.  The modern rendition was completed in 2000.

Final turn….. 

After spending some time on the track, we headed inside the pagoda.  First stop: the press room.  the guide gave loads of interesting facts, then invited people to sit behind the press stand.  Our boys had people in stitches with what they were saying.  

Then on to the winners podium.  Isaac had a strop cos Oliver got to stand in winners position first

The boys loved it (though Isaac really needed a wee by now!) 

We were able to go to various different levels of the pagoda, the media room, where commentators and press from around the world are placed when races are on; the very top, where the VIP's sit.  The views were amazing from the top.

We headed back down, and waited to get back on the bus.  Here's Oliver dreaming of his future...

The tour of Indianapolis Motor Speedway is well worth doing.  It is a good 90 minutes, and our boys only started getting bored towards the end.  Well worth doing.  For tour times check here

We headed back to the museum for a final look around, and a trip to the gift shop for souvenirs.  The boys nada hard time deciding which cars they wanted, and we came away with much more than we anticipated…. 

Then it was time to drive under the stands and out on the main road for our next adventure….

Indianapolis: Indianapolis Zoo

We left Port Clinton as early as we could.  The gentleman who we rented the condo from wanted to come and check it before we left, which I can fully understand.  Once that was done we hit the road.

It was a rainy miserable drive, I drove first.  Ohio and Indianapolis are very flat places, with not much to see than the odd farm.  We stopped at a Burger King for lunch, another special local one.  The boys were certainly amusing for the locals.

We continued on, with the aim of visiting Indianapolis Zoo before checking into the hotel.  We drove through some interesting areas of Indianapolis en route.

We arrived at the zoo about 1.30.  It had been raining here most of the morning, so it wasn't too busy. Our first stop was the aquarium part.  The boys have a real thing for marine animals, and they loved being able to touch a shark.

Then it was out to see the polar bear.  So beautiful, with a pretty good size enclosure.  He had obviously enjoyed the rain that morning.

There was a dolphin show going on at the time, and we managed to head up past the show area, towards the orangutans.  There has been a new enclosure/research area built for them recently.  There are huge posts very high in the sky with ropes attached to them, which the orangutans are able to access from their indoor enclosure.  So good to see stimulus for them.  Inside their enclosure, one of the orangutans was doing a demonstration on a huge computer where he was matching shapes.  Such intelligent animals.

From there we headed to the plains area.

Like Columbia Zoo, you can pay extra to feed the giraffes, though we did not do this 

They have beautiful cheetahs, in a good size enclosure.  On weekend days they have an activity (pay extra of course)  where you can race the cheetahs up and down the fence.  Paul snapped this beautiful photo of this guy taking a stroll.

But we had to take a trip to see the elephants.  Since Joys departure from Greenville Zoo, Seb has been missing his elephant fix.  He was so happy to see this large herd.  But by now, the sun had come out, and it was time for some refreshment. 

We headed back to the central area, and had a couple of drinks.  The boys monkeyed around…..

We already had tickets to see the dolphin show at 4.30, so we decided to check out the rest of the zoo.  We were lucky enough to see a couple of brown bears having a play in the water.

We still had some time to kill, so we decided to let the boys go on the carousel.  They all loved it.  Seb was pleased as punch to be able to ride an elephant.

Then it was time for the dolphin show!  We parked the buggy and took our seats.  We were unsure how Seb would react, after the palaver of Seaworld last summer.  It was an ok show, nothing spectacular, and they appeared to be a dolphin trainer down.  The kids still loved it though.  It was just the right intensity for them.  Seb was shaking, but we think he was just in awe of these amazing creatures and being so close to them.

We were one of the last groups out of the zoo, through the gift shop of course.  We drove to our hotel, less than 10 minutes from the zoo.  We checked in, and parks the car in the underground car park.

We went for dinner in the TGI Fridays next door.  It wasn't a good experience, in fact none of our trips to that chain have been.  I can't be bothered to take the time to give them a bad review, lets just say it wasn't well maintained, service was slack, and it was only Monday.  

After dinner we took a little walk around the block where the hotel was.  It was downtown, on what I would call Marriott corner.  There was about 5 different brands of Marriott hotel, all on the same block. Funnily enough right by a baseball field and the convention centre.  Talk about a monopoly...

I really liked downtown Indianapolis.  It reminded me of Greenville in lots of ways.  Parts of the center have under gone regeneration fairly recently, and are pretty nice.  Definitely somewhere I would like to go back to.  

Port Clinton, Lake Erie

The drive from Buffalo to Port Clinton, Ohio took about 4 hours.  A pretty straight drive along the edge of Lake Erie. 

We had booked a condo through VRBO on the Waterfront II complex.  It wasn't directly on the lake, but you could still see it through the gaps of the other condos.  We were a little early getting there, and the owner was just cleaning up as we arrived.

We got settled quickly and headed to the pool. This was a very nice pool…..

With water sprinklers by the side which the kids loved.  

We played for a while before heading back to the condo and trying to decide what to do for dinner.  Port Clinton is probably best known for being the gateway to Lake Erie's islands, Put-in-Bay is probably the best known of these.  We had already decided not to visit the islands, we were here to relax after the craziness we had just been through!

We decided to walk to check out the town, so we headed out over the draw bridge in the direction of town, passing the boat terminal on the way.

There is not a lot in Port Clinton, 2-3 restaurants and a couple of bars.  We eventually settled on McCarthy's.  This is an irish pub/ restaurant that was pretty popular.  We were seated quickly in the window.  The server was very prompt, polite and friendly.  I ordered a Shocktop, Paul had a Harp, and the boys all had sodas.  Once we had our drinks, we ordered our food.  Typically Isaac and Seb had grilled cheese sandwiches, Oliver had a cheese burger.  Paul can't remember what he had (so should have done this a while ago), but thinks it was chicken of some description.  I decided to go with the Irish Stew, hoping it was like my mum made.

Unfortunately, it wasn't. It didn't taste quite right, almost like it had too much celery in it.  Such a shame, as I had ordered a large portion. I did my best, but it wasn't great.  Everyone else finished theirs though.  I did make my thought known to the server, so hopefully he passed on my comments to the chef.  Other than that, its a good restaurant, very accommodating with a good atmosphere.  

On our walk back, we were fortunate enough to see the bridge open to let some sail boats through.

The next day was spent relaxing.  The whole point of coming to Port Clinton was to relax.  We spent some time on the lake beach,  nice to play near dead fish.  I must admit, although Lake Erie's level of pollution has improved, we are still not very keen on Lake beaches.  Maybe we will come round one day.  We spent most of the day going between the pool and the condo.  Being on holiday in the States is awesome, particularly by the pool.  There are always plenty of people with a beer in their hand, even at 10 in the morning!  Makes you want to join the party as early as possible…..

We decide to try Dock's Beach House for dinner that evening.  This place is on the beach, and a 2 minute walk away.  You could hear it from the condo in the evening.  There was a bit of a wait for a table, but we were able to grab a couple of seats at the bar for the boys while we waited.  We all indulged in drinks, the boys with soda, I had a frozen cocktail and Paul had a beer.   

We waited about 15 minutes before we got a seat outside.  The boys ordered the usual (same thing they had the night before).  We are 100% sure we both had a steak, though I think they may have changed their menu since we went.  

Although the place was busy, the server was attentive at just the right level.  The food came in a timely manner.  The boys meals were served on frisbees (awesome idea), and they demolished all of theirs.  Mine and Paul's steaks were delicious, really nice and tender, and perfectly cooked.

We headed home, nice and full.  We awoke the next day to this…..

It rained all morning.  We decided to have lunch at Dock's.  It just stopped raining as we headed out the door.  It was not as busy as the night before, and we didn't have to wait to be seated.  We ended up with the same server again, which was nice, as she remembered us.  Turns out she was from Bali, so we swapped many stories about living in a foreign country.  We ordered drinks, Paul and I decided to try an Ohio Rose wine.  It was lush, and the bottle was gone in no time.  The kids had the same food again, though Paul and I went with sandwiches this time.  Paul had the grilled chicken on a Kaiser roll, and I had the Beachhouse Chicken Sandwich on a croissant.  Again, the food and service did not disappoint.  It was raining again, so we decided to have dessert.  We shared 2 chocolate melting puddings between us, and they were yummy.  Paul and I barely got any, as the boys loved them.  We really liked Docks Beach House, it has a real holiday feel, very comfortable, friendly and well managed.  We ended up wit h6 frisbees, and Paul and I both purchased a t-shirt (something we hardly ever do…..)

After all that rain, there was a lot of puddles around the condo complex.  It would have been rude to not  let the kids splash in the puddles…..

We kicked around the condo in the evening, just relaxing before the next stage of our journey.  We did sneak out to take this beautiful photo of the sunset over Lake Erie.  Stunning…...