Day 2: Traveling Through History in Dayton, OH

"The first time it was a tragedy

the second time is a farce.

Outside it's 1933

so I'm hitting the bar."  

-1933 by Frank Turner

Day Two of our trip featured a little less driving and a lot of history!  It was an easy, three hour-ish drive from Cleveland to Dayton on the highway.  After two days on Ohio highways, we came to the conclusion that the roads in Ohio are worse than PA (despite the fact that we all love to gripe about our roads at home).  RJ decided the "Construction Zone Ahead" sign is the state sign of Ohio.  However, we didn't get stuck in any traffic and we made it to our destination - the National Museum of the United States Air Force - just a little after noon.  

RJ has been to this museum twice before, but he really wanted to visit again.  It was obvious why - the place is huge!  There are four separate buildings all attached that are themed after different periods of history or types of planes/craft.  We started with a guided tour of the World War I and II building.  Our tour guide did a great job highlighting everything and picking and choosing some smaller details to share with the group so we could get through that one building in about 90 minutes.  

We enjoy visiting the Air Mobility Command museum in Dover, DE almost every time we go to the beach. The museum in Dayton had a lot, lot, LOT more planes and displays.  While Dover has one C-130 in their museum, Dayton has multiple.  Dover has one former Air Force One plane while Dayton has three or four.  The planes at Dayton are also a lot more historically significant, like the Memphis Belle, which was the first Eighth Air Force bomber to fly 25 combat missions over occupied Europe during WWII and return to the U.S. without a crewman being killed. However, the one thing we like better about the Dover museum over Dayton is that when the planes are open to the public, there is very little roped off or glassed off.  Usually just the cockpits.  In Dayton, every plane we walked through had glass paneling covering everything but the walkway to preserve and protect the planes as they are.  Definitely understandable, considering the significance of the planes and the amount of foot traffic they see every single day, but definitely a reason for those of you who haven't already done so to check out the Air Mobility Command Museum in Dover!  

Since we are trying to stick to a budget, we had eaten pretty light meals for breakfast and lunch, and we had definitely worked up an appetite by the time we were done at the Air Force Museum.  After checking out all of our options, we settled on the Carillon Brewing Co. in Dayton.  This place was a great find!  It is situated in the Carillon Historical Park, which is a lovely green space with a museum, gift shop, and restaurant right along the Miami River.  The restaurant is a non-profit organization that is set up to look and operate like an old-time brew house from the 1800s.  The building is beautiful, the staff dress in period clothing, and the drinks are tasty!  The food was delicious, too, and all of the dishes are made with recipes from that time period.  After our meal, we enjoyed walking the walking/biking trail along the river.  Amanda had introduced us to the metroparks of Cleveland, and Dayton had their fair share as well.  Definitely a strong point of Ohio's - great outside spaces incorporated into their cities!  

After dinner, we settled in at a cheaper hotel off the highway for the evening.  It was supposed to be a Baymont Inn, but apparently it had changed hands since we booked our reservation.  All I'll say is RJ is now very skeptical of our hotel budget for this trip, and we've been erring on the side of over-budget when booking our next few hotels!  In the grand scheme of bad hotel stays, it probably wasn't THAT bad, but we weren't too sad to put it behind us in the morning!