Day 1: Christmas Vacation

We seem to be having a hard time sitting still these days. With Christmas day behind us and a full week before it was time to return to work, we'd wondered just what to do with our free time. Normally, we'd spend it at home relaxing, sleeping in late, watching movies, and having lots of company. But this year we all had the same thought: Road Trip!

But where to go? That was the tough question. Madison and I immediately suggested London, but that was too expensive (and considering the current world situation, not the best time to travel to Europe). Naturally, WDW is always a suggestion, but none of us wanted to go this week, which is their busiest time of the year (January is another story).

Then Marsha got the great idea of going back to Cleveland and re-visiting the Christmas Story House at Christmas! Even better, we could have dinner again at Lola, Michael Symon's restaurant. We've been dying to go back there ever since our first visit two years ago, but Cleveland Which is a little out of the way for us. Perfect opportunity.

After some thought, however, we realized a couple of things: 1) As much as we lived the Christmas Story House, we really just wanted to eat at Lola. 2) Chicago is only five miles further (Madison pointed this out).

So there you have it: drive all the way to Cleveland just to eat at Lola. For anyone that knows us, that is perfectly understandable. Unfortunately, Lola was all booked for dinner, so we grabbed a lunch reservation instead before hitting the road for Chicago tomorrow.

After a long day yesterday due to driving back and forth to a family get-together, we hit the road this morning an hour later than planned. However, since we were taking I-77 all the way there through the western tip of Virginia, then West Virginia, and Ohio, we weren't too worried about traffic jams. The route was a near exact duplicate of the first leg of our cross-country trip two years ago. I'd forgotten that it was mostly mountains practically the entire way.

It was a nice leisurely drive the whole way and the perfect start to our trip. Despite leaving late, we still had an extra hour of wiggle room on our ETA. Which was good, because we managed to use it up looking for an ATM in West Virginia. We also had a fair amount of rain for a good stretch, but luckily we managed to drive out of it after crossing into Ohio. It had dropped down to 40 by the time we reached Cleveland, which was actually a welcome change from the unusually balmy 75 degrees we'd left back home in NC.

Keeping with the Michael Symon's theme, we'd booked dinner at the Flying Fig, which we'd seen on his newest show, Burgers, Brew, and 'Que (which, for some reason, only showcased restaurants in NYC, Cleveland, and Nashville on every episode). We ended up just driving straight there, which was no big deal. Downtown Cleveland is pretty quiet on a Sunday night in the dead of winter. Shocking, I know.

The food at Flying Fig was fantastic. I had the burger (would Michael Symon have it any other way?) and Madison was all set to have the pasta until she heard about the pork chop with cheese grits special. 

Afterwards, it was off to our hotel, the Westin. As much as we liked our hotel from the last trip, this time we opted for something more centrally located. The room is huge and as I already mentioned, downtown Cleveland is pretty quiet.

Not a bad way to start the trip.