I woke up early and packed up and prepared to depart Cincinnati. I decided to have a good breakfast, so I started on the way to Cleveland, and exited just north of Cincinnati to have breakfast at a Waffle House restaurant. Theirs isn't the best food in the world, but their pecan waffles keep me coming back. After breakfast I fueled up and got back on the road towards Columbus and Cleveland. This was highway 71, which cuts across the state from North to South and East to West, so I would be seeing as much of Ohio as possible.
Columbus is about 100 miles northeast of Cincinnati, and I made good time stopping just before Columbus to gas up. Columbus is the capital, and if you stay on 71 it takes you right through the heart of the city. There is a river you cross, and while going north on 71 the downtown is to your left. It looked like a beautiful city but I didn't stop at all. I kept going until I got to Belleville where I stopped for a bottle of water and decided to have lunch. Troyers Dutch Heritage restaurant is just off the exit there, and the food was amazing. I had a "Manhattan" which is an open faced sandwich covered in gravy. You could get turkey, roast beef, meatloaf, etc. I got the roast beef, which was basically a hot beef sandwich, and it was probably the best one I have ever had. Everything was homemade including the roast beef, gravy and the potatoes. I had peach cobbler for dessert and I felt very satisfied leaving there - I didn't think I would need to have dinner after that. http://troyercorp.com/restaurant/bellville/bellville.php.
I got back on the road for the run into Cleveland, and I arrived at my hotel in Cleveland about 5pm. I got checked in and then decided to do my laundry as I had planned to do so at this hotel, and I did need clean jeans, etc. It was quite a sight on the bed with everything pulled out of my bags to find the dirty clothes - seel the picture below. It was $3 total to wash and dry a load including soap, and by 6:15 I had all my clothes clean. I changed into clean shorts and t-shirt and headed off towards the ballpark for the baseball game.
It was about a 15 minute walk to the stadium and I just followed the crowds to get there. The ballpark there is now called Progressive field, but it used to be Jacobs field and most fans there still call it that. It is one of the newer parks in that it is very open and accessible to the fans. One disappointment was that you couldn't walk all the way around the park, and I started at one end and walked all the way to the other to get to my seats. Speaking of my seats, I bought a ticket from a scalper for $20, and it was lower level about 1/2 way down the third base line into the outfield. Great seats and there were players warming up right in front of us. Definitely the best seats for any game during the trip.
Food at the park was decent. I had a hot dog that was above average, and found a stand with an Italian sausage with peppers that was good as well. Overall above average for food, but there wasn't much variety, so that could have been better. Nothing like some parks where you can have almost anything you desire. The Indians played the Orioles, and won the game13-8, so the crowd was totally into the game. There were a few home runs and they shoot off fireworks for those, so it was quite a sight. I am very excited to have outdoor baseball in Minnesota for the 2010 season and then I can compare it to other parks that are outdoors.
When I left the park I wasn't ready to go back to the hotel yet, and looked for a late night place to have a couple of beers. I ended up at The Winking Lizard - http://www.winkinglizard.com/data/content/. This place wasn't very busy when I arrived, but got busier as the night progressed. I sat at the bar and talked to some guys from Minnesota who were in town on business. They hadn't gone to the game however and I recommended they do so tomorrow night. I also talked to a gal and her boyfriend about the Indians and other things. It is always great to talk to the fans and hear about their loyalty and how much they like their teams. These two were very passionate. I had a few beers and left sometime after midnight, and then had trouble finding my hotel. I got turned around on the streets and ended up taking a very indirect route, but I did eventually find it.
I pretty much went to sleep right away as I had a few beers in me and I had a long day. Tomorrow I would be heading to Detroit for the Tigers game, so I had another day of driving ahead of me. Total mileage today was 259.7 miles.
Until Tuesday...
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