Places visited: Kansas City
Date: 18/04/2019 to 21/04/2019
Persons: Harshal, Juilee, Radhika.
18/04/2019
For me and Radhika 19 April was a holiday on the occasion of Good Friday. Juilee had to take a vacation from office, as she does not get the holidays. We initially planned a lot and booked hotel and rides at cuyahoga national park. But due to rains and storms, we had to cancel those bookings on 16th April. And then we decided on Kansas City.
On 18th April, I was working from home, Juilee came from the work at around 2:30 PM. Till then I had packed all the bags. We just loaded the car trunk and then went to Radhika's school. Juilee was driving the car. We picked Radhika at 3:00 PM and took the I80 west. Radhika ate her packed tiffin and then slept very well. We filled petrol at Des Moines Sam's club and then turned towards south. It was still little cold in the Midwest, but as we went towards south, the temperature got little bearable for Indians :). We had already packed the Dry Bhel which I ate for my evening snacks. Juilee drove like a professional driver. She did not even stopped for dinner (Except sometime for a tea, Girnar premix tea are a lifesaver. We just stop at any holiday-inn or a Casey's petrol pump or any other gas station to get hot water and then mix this girnar tea powder to get an amazing ginger/lemon grass/masala tea - very Indian style. Its better than coffee. Coffee makes you dehydrated. Tea keeps you recharged.). Me and Radhika ate poories, but Juilee was determined to hit the hotel and then only have dinner. We entered Kansas City at around 9:00 PM. It is a bigger city than Moline, so there are many lanes, separate bus-lanes, cross traffic, honking (but better than Chicago), so Juilee got confused for few minutes, and I got furious and we had a small verbal fight as well. But eventually she found her way through it and we reached to the hotel at 9:30 PM.
Being in the center of the city, there are very limited parking spots. Fortunately few parking spots were open at the hotel premises. We parked there. The reception person at the hotel offered us water bottles as we were doing the check-in formalities. That's surprising. Usually American hotels are lesser aware about Indian hospitality manners (For e.g. in India we offer water to guests as a good gesture).
We hit the room, Juilee did her dinner. Radhika was so tired that she slept within a minute. We prepared a plan for the next day and then went to bed.
19/04/2019
We woke up lazy and did breakfast in the hotel's breakfast area. The breakfast is good with bread, jelly, cereals, milk, coffee, waffles, etc. I am waiting for that day when American hotels serve at least one item from some hot and spicy Indian breakfast items like Pohe, Idli-Sambar, Upama, etc. We ate Waffles, Cereals and then after doing all the morning rituals, we took the uber to Union Station.
It is a metro station. The metros run underground, but on top of the ground, there is a whole different world hosting Science City, Planetarium, Restaurants, Theaters, etc. It is neat, clean and disciplined.
The science city opened at 10:00 AM and we bought the tickets (Actually we should not have bought the tickets as we are already a member of Family Museum at Bettendorf, but we forgot about it). We enjoyed many experiments related with sound, light, physics. We also got chance to touch the horn of a dinosaur died millions of years ago. At around noon, we came out of the science city and had (an expensive) lunch at a restaurant just in front of the science city. Then we went back in and enjoyed some other science experiments. There are some illusions which are quite amazing -
like a tilted room. There is a planetarium as well, but there were only movie shows at that time, so we did not went in. There is a big area outside of the building, There are toys like rope-sliding, etc which your kids can enjoy while you are pulling or pushing them. We had a good fun on a wheel, which was spun by me and one more gentleman and kids inside it were having fun. We enjoyed there till 2:00 PM.
Then, I bought the tickets for legoland online. You can book time slot for the ticket to avoid queues. I booked for 3:00 PM. The legoland is in the Crown Center which is connected to Union Station by a sky bridge. We went there by a walk inside the sky bridge enjoying the surrounding view. After reaching the crown center, we had to go outside and cross the road and then we entered in the legoland.
The first station is a free form station with loads of Lego blocks of different sizes, shapes and colors.
You can build whatever you want. Then there is a station with video cameras, so you can build your own Lego movie by clicking step by step photos. Radhika enjoyed it a lot. Then we saw a 4D movies of Lego Ninjas. After that we also did a Lego workshop which is guided by a volunteer. We had tea and some snacks in the cafe and then we took a virtual reality ride which was amazing (with extra cost). We were exhausted and then decided to walk out to go for a stage show (for which tickets were booked online in advance).
The stage show was in the crown cetner's "Coterie Theatre". The
show was named as "Beatles". It was about the bugs and how they saved a strawberry garden. It started little late but it was amazing. There were like 60 chairs, but kids sat down in front of the stage. The actors were amazing. We got to know that it was the first show and hence they served ice cream and fresh fruits after the show. The ice cream was amazing (Ice cream chya bhajyasarkha hota).
After the show, we returned to hotel and slept like hell.
20/04/2019
This was Radhika's 7th birthday. We did not do any cake rituals as most of her friends were out of Moline due to long weekend (so we celebrated her birthday on 24th instead at home in Springs at Bettendorf). We went to The National Museum of Toys and Miniatures. It has a parking, but we went
by Uber. There is a big revolving pillar which stands from first to second floor and showcases various toys. The first floor is dedicated to miniatures. It has a lot of micro models of big objects like chair, sofa, dish, a room, book, people, etc. There are many models of old-style homes with all the objects inside those homes. There are models of various instruments as well. Each section has a magnifying glass so that you can enjoy by zooming the objects a little bit. There are videos played in a room to show how these miniature models are made. There also an activity where you can try to fit an arm to a watch which is a miniature model. Radhika enjoyed this part of the museum very well. At noon, we went outside of the building and sat on a staircase and had some protein bars and chips as a lunch. We went back and then enjoyed the second floor which is made up of all the toys collection. You can not play with the toys, but those are only for display. The collection has toys from 17th century which is amazing. There are very old dolls, cars, doll houses, soft toys, barbies, etc. Radhika enjoyed this part as well. The collections are kept in glass boxes and the glass is so clean that once Radhika hit a glass and started crying. Sometime later she got to boost up her mood as she saw a life size doll house kept for playing. She played there for half an hour and then we started winding up the tour. We bought her a gift from the gift shop and then went out, took Uber and went to Union Station (as Radhika wanted to eat at the same restaurant where we ate the day before.). But the restaurant was closed, so we walked to the Crown Cetner and then tried the "Curry in a Hurry" Thali. It was good!
Then we used the free KC Streetcar which starts from union station's outside terminal and takes you around 2 miles to the market and drives you back. We take that ride just to enjoy the views of the Kansas city for free.
Then we spent some time at the Henry Wollman Bloch Fountain which is just in front of the Union Station. It's a landmark fountain featuring 232 jets of water set to a timed display, with colorful lights at night. Then we took Uber to the hotel.
21/04/2019
I was bored of the hotel's sweet American/continental breakfast, so I ate ready-to-eat MTR pohe and Juilee and Radhika ate the sweet breakfast. We checked out from the hotel and then by car went to nelson-atkins museum of art which is like 2 minutes drive from the hotel. Fortunately there was one place to park the car in public road-side parking. The outside of the museum has some sculptures and some huge shuttle-cocks.
The museum is quite big and go in there only if you have some interest in arts, sculptures and murals, etc. (else just take some photos outside and go somewhere else).
The museum is free. The rule is you need to carry your bag on one shoulder or in the front on your chest, to protect the artifacts from being damaged. It has really amazing collection of artifacts like sculptures, pots and pans, documents, cloths, mummies, weapons from hundreds of centuries old. There are sculptures from Indian subcontinent (like Ganpati, Shankar, Durga devi, etc). I liked the mummy section which displays the real mummy and the container which was used to store the mummy. It Kansas City Zoo as our last spot before return to home.
was scary :). There are some quiz pamphlets and pencils kept in each section so that kids would not get bored (Radhika enjoyed those pamphlets). There are also high chairs in each section, so that you can just seat and stare at the artifacts for however long
you want to do that. The restrooms are neat and clean. There is a small (but very expensive) cafeteria as well. I enjoyed the museum a lot. We went out at 11:00 AM and drove to the
The zoo is not as big as Omaha zoo, but still you can spend an entire day there. We did have only 3 hours, so we rushed through the major exhibits like Tiger, Kangaroo, Penguins, etc. There is train ride and skyfari (rope-way) which you can use to go from one section of the zoo to another, but you need to buy a multi-ride ticket (premium that's what they call it) for using it. Skyfari was not working, so we used train to travel within the zoo. The sun was really high and we kept ourselves hydrated enough. At each train station, you can park your kid's stroller or wheelchair. We did not take many photos in the zoo as we have already seen lot of these animals in other zoos like in Omaha, etc. But the parakeets here were amazing.
We started return journey at 3:30 PM and we managed to reach Bettendorf at around 9:30 PM.
Date: 18/04/2019 to 21/04/2019
Persons: Harshal, Juilee, Radhika.
18/04/2019
On 18th April, I was working from home, Juilee came from the work at around 2:30 PM. Till then I had packed all the bags. We just loaded the car trunk and then went to Radhika's school. Juilee was driving the car. We picked Radhika at 3:00 PM and took the I80 west. Radhika ate her packed tiffin and then slept very well. We filled petrol at Des Moines Sam's club and then turned towards south. It was still little cold in the Midwest, but as we went towards south, the temperature got little bearable for Indians :). We had already packed the Dry Bhel which I ate for my evening snacks. Juilee drove like a professional driver. She did not even stopped for dinner (Except sometime for a tea, Girnar premix tea are a lifesaver. We just stop at any holiday-inn or a Casey's petrol pump or any other gas station to get hot water and then mix this girnar tea powder to get an amazing ginger/lemon grass/masala tea - very Indian style. Its better than coffee. Coffee makes you dehydrated. Tea keeps you recharged.). Me and Radhika ate poories, but Juilee was determined to hit the hotel and then only have dinner. We entered Kansas City at around 9:00 PM. It is a bigger city than Moline, so there are many lanes, separate bus-lanes, cross traffic, honking (but better than Chicago), so Juilee got confused for few minutes, and I got furious and we had a small verbal fight as well. But eventually she found her way through it and we reached to the hotel at 9:30 PM.
Being in the center of the city, there are very limited parking spots. Fortunately few parking spots were open at the hotel premises. We parked there. The reception person at the hotel offered us water bottles as we were doing the check-in formalities. That's surprising. Usually American hotels are lesser aware about Indian hospitality manners (For e.g. in India we offer water to guests as a good gesture).
We hit the room, Juilee did her dinner. Radhika was so tired that she slept within a minute. We prepared a plan for the next day and then went to bed.
19/04/2019
We woke up lazy and did breakfast in the hotel's breakfast area. The breakfast is good with bread, jelly, cereals, milk, coffee, waffles, etc. I am waiting for that day when American hotels serve at least one item from some hot and spicy Indian breakfast items like Pohe, Idli-Sambar, Upama, etc. We ate Waffles, Cereals and then after doing all the morning rituals, we took the uber to Union Station.
The science city opened at 10:00 AM and we bought the tickets (Actually we should not have bought the tickets as we are already a member of Family Museum at Bettendorf, but we forgot about it). We enjoyed many experiments related with sound, light, physics. We also got chance to touch the horn of a dinosaur died millions of years ago. At around noon, we came out of the science city and had (an expensive) lunch at a restaurant just in front of the science city. Then we went back in and enjoyed some other science experiments. There are some illusions which are quite amazing -
Then, I bought the tickets for legoland online. You can book time slot for the ticket to avoid queues. I booked for 3:00 PM. The legoland is in the Crown Center which is connected to Union Station by a sky bridge. We went there by a walk inside the sky bridge enjoying the surrounding view. After reaching the crown center, we had to go outside and cross the road and then we entered in the legoland.
The first station is a free form station with loads of Lego blocks of different sizes, shapes and colors.
The stage show was in the crown cetner's "Coterie Theatre". The
After the show, we returned to hotel and slept like hell.
20/04/2019
This was Radhika's 7th birthday. We did not do any cake rituals as most of her friends were out of Moline due to long weekend (so we celebrated her birthday on 24th instead at home in Springs at Bettendorf). We went to The National Museum of Toys and Miniatures. It has a parking, but we went
by Uber. There is a big revolving pillar which stands from first to second floor and showcases various toys. The first floor is dedicated to miniatures. It has a lot of micro models of big objects like chair, sofa, dish, a room, book, people, etc. There are many models of old-style homes with all the objects inside those homes. There are models of various instruments as well. Each section has a magnifying glass so that you can enjoy by zooming the objects a little bit. There are videos played in a room to show how these miniature models are made. There also an activity where you can try to fit an arm to a watch which is a miniature model. Radhika enjoyed this part of the museum very well. At noon, we went outside of the building and sat on a staircase and had some protein bars and chips as a lunch. We went back and then enjoyed the second floor which is made up of all the toys collection. You can not play with the toys, but those are only for display. The collection has toys from 17th century which is amazing. There are very old dolls, cars, doll houses, soft toys, barbies, etc. Radhika enjoyed this part as well. The collections are kept in glass boxes and the glass is so clean that once Radhika hit a glass and started crying. Sometime later she got to boost up her mood as she saw a life size doll house kept for playing. She played there for half an hour and then we started winding up the tour. We bought her a gift from the gift shop and then went out, took Uber and went to Union Station (as Radhika wanted to eat at the same restaurant where we ate the day before.). But the restaurant was closed, so we walked to the Crown Cetner and then tried the "Curry in a Hurry" Thali. It was good!
Then we used the free KC Streetcar which starts from union station's outside terminal and takes you around 2 miles to the market and drives you back. We take that ride just to enjoy the views of the Kansas city for free.Then we spent some time at the Henry Wollman Bloch Fountain which is just in front of the Union Station. It's a landmark fountain featuring 232 jets of water set to a timed display, with colorful lights at night. Then we took Uber to the hotel.
21/04/2019
I was bored of the hotel's sweet American/continental breakfast, so I ate ready-to-eat MTR pohe and Juilee and Radhika ate the sweet breakfast. We checked out from the hotel and then by car went to nelson-atkins museum of art which is like 2 minutes drive from the hotel. Fortunately there was one place to park the car in public road-side parking. The outside of the museum has some sculptures and some huge shuttle-cocks.The museum is quite big and go in there only if you have some interest in arts, sculptures and murals, etc. (else just take some photos outside and go somewhere else).
The museum is free. The rule is you need to carry your bag on one shoulder or in the front on your chest, to protect the artifacts from being damaged. It has really amazing collection of artifacts like sculptures, pots and pans, documents, cloths, mummies, weapons from hundreds of centuries old. There are sculptures from Indian subcontinent (like Ganpati, Shankar, Durga devi, etc). I liked the mummy section which displays the real mummy and the container which was used to store the mummy. It Kansas City Zoo as our last spot before return to home.
you want to do that. The restrooms are neat and clean. There is a small (but very expensive) cafeteria as well. I enjoyed the museum a lot. We went out at 11:00 AM and drove to the
The zoo is not as big as Omaha zoo, but still you can spend an entire day there. We did have only 3 hours, so we rushed through the major exhibits like Tiger, Kangaroo, Penguins, etc. There is train ride and skyfari (rope-way) which you can use to go from one section of the zoo to another, but you need to buy a multi-ride ticket (premium that's what they call it) for using it. Skyfari was not working, so we used train to travel within the zoo. The sun was really high and we kept ourselves hydrated enough. At each train station, you can park your kid's stroller or wheelchair. We did not take many photos in the zoo as we have already seen lot of these animals in other zoos like in Omaha, etc. But the parakeets here were amazing.
We started return journey at 3:30 PM and we managed to reach Bettendorf at around 9:30 PM.
Details:
Hotel: Best Western Plus Seville Plaza Hotel, 4309 Main St, Kansas City, MO 64111.
KC Street Car: http://kcstreetcar.org/
Hotel: Best Western Plus Seville Plaza Hotel, 4309 Main St, Kansas City, MO 64111.
KC Street Car: http://kcstreetcar.org/
Union Station: https://www.unionstation.org/
Crown Center: https://www.crowncenter.com/
The National Museum of Toys and Miniatures: https://toyandminiaturemuseum.org/
nelson-atkins museum of art: https://www.nelson-atkins.org/
Kansas City Zoo: https://www.kansascityzoo.org/
Expenses:
Science City (covered in Family Museum membership, but we forgot and paid for the ticket):
Coterie Theatre show:
Legoland:
Kansas City Zoo:
The National Museum of Toys and Miniatures:
Best Western Plus Seville Plaza Hotel:
Food:
Crown Center: https://www.crowncenter.com/
The National Museum of Toys and Miniatures: https://toyandminiaturemuseum.org/
nelson-atkins museum of art: https://www.nelson-atkins.org/
Kansas City Zoo: https://www.kansascityzoo.org/
Expenses:
Science City (covered in Family Museum membership, but we forgot and paid for the ticket):
Coterie Theatre show:
Legoland:
Kansas City Zoo:
The National Museum of Toys and Miniatures:
Best Western Plus Seville Plaza Hotel:
Food:
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