Rock On!

We were up before dawn today as we set off on our first day of school trip. Oddly, we both still don't sleep well on the night before school starts. Maybe it will go away one year! The drive to Cleveland is only a little over four hours so we arrived in good time after a stop at Costco. I knew that our hotel was an old bank but we were really impressed when we saw the place. The original building was constructed in 1845 and served as a bank for most of its life. The building is quite amazing inside and out. 

Our outing for the day was a visit to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. I have to admit that I wasn't really to excited to go. I thought it would be a cheesy kind of place. And, I was wrong! There were seven floors of exhibits, displays, movies and audio presentations. 

The outside looks like a pyramid from the front. 

The displays had a lot of original instruments, clothes and music from decades of musicians.

We start off with Katy Perry's concert worn dress. I only took this one for our niece Paige.

If you have Katy, you also have to get Lady Gaga's "dress" from another concert.

And then there were the guitars! I'm not sure how the Hall acquired them but they certainly have an amazing collection. 

Here are a couple of Jimi Hendrix's left handed guitars. The second is his Fender Stratocaster.

An early picture of the Rolling Stones.

Janice Joplin's Porsche!

A decorated accoustic from Bruce Springsteen.

Clarence Clemmons' Sax.

There are many of the original written version of songs. I found these fascinating. This one is London Calling by The Clash.

The Supremes!

There's a whole room deciated to Elvis which has one of his custom motorcycles.

There's a great display based on The Wall by Pink Floyd. 

The final part that we saw was a concert experience. It's a separate room where you sit under the concert stage scaffolding and what a movie made of segment of concert footage from the 60s to recent events. All in all, it was amazing.

We were quite impressed to learn that our hotel was throwing a reception for people in the IHG rewards club. They kindly provided free wine, beer and snacks that we enjoyed before heading out to walk on 4th Street. There was a Cleveland Indians baseball game so the restaurants were fairly busy. After talking to a traffic cop, we ended up at the Winking Lizard which had the required local beers. We enoyed our dinner and are now back in our room watching the game and trying not to fall asleep too early!