For my Columbus to do list, I chose to go to the Downtown and Franklinton areas. While there were several other lists that seemed interesting to me, I chose this one for three reasons. The first reason was because I plan on remaining a student at The Ohio State University for the next three years and possibly even after that, therefore it will be helpful to know of some good places to eat and interesting things to see downtown, not to mention that it forced me to learn how the bus schedule works. There is also a chance that I will end up working and living in Columbus after college, so I thought it would be a good idea to get some experience navigating new parts of a busy city in order to prepare myself for a future here. The second reason that I chose this list is because I have a lot of family that lives in the area, so knowing how to get to and what to expect places like the science and art museums could be helpful when my family members want to get together with me and do something. The third and final reason that I chose this list is because, although I have family in the area, I have only really been into the city once and did not do much while there, so I wanted to be able to experience the city more. The downtown and Franklinton list seemed to have a little bit of everything, including museums, parks, and places to eat, therefore I chose to go to some of each of those places.
The five locations that I chose to visit were Dirty Frank’s Hot Dog Palace, the Columbus Art Museum, The Scioto Mile, the 16-Bit Barcade, and COSI. Out of these, the two that I was most excited to visit were the Scioto Mile and the 16-Bit Barcade.
The first location that I visited was Dirty Frank’s Hot Dog Palace. To get there, a few friends and I took a bus from campus for about fifteen minutes and then walked for about five or ten, but when we arrived, it was well worth it. Before we were even seated I liked it there because of the décor, which consisted of rock and roll posters, skateboards, and snowboards all over the walls. While the atmosphere was interesting, the food was the best part. I ordered two hot dogs and was a bit skeptical about how a hot dog could be as good as people told me they were, but when my food got to the table I was not disappointed. My only complaint was that for only two hot dogs, it was about eight dollars, but both were delicious so I would go there again anytime. Of course, after having had such a good experience, I would recommend this to any hungry friend.
After Dirty Frank’s, we tried to go to the 16-Bit Barcade, which I was very excited for. Unfortunately, when we tried to go in, we were informed that because it was a bar, we had to be 21 to enter, so all we could do was look in and see what it looked like. From the outside, it looked like they had some good games and it probably would have been fun if we had been allowed in. Overall I would say that, if you are already at Dirty Frank’s and are over 21, then you should stop in for a few minutes and at least play some games because of how close it is.
The next place on my list was the Scioto Mile, which was also slightly disappointing. The day that I went, it was rainy and slightly cold, so it was not a great day to be outside in the first place, but on top of that, there was construction underway. This meant that there was not a whole lot going on: the outdoor rock wall was not there, the interactive fountain was gone, and the landscape was full of construction equipment, dirt, and a minimal amount of grass. Even though there was not a lot to do, I still walked down the path next to the river for a short time and looked at all of the structures such as pavilions and bridges that were around and those were very nice. Even with the construction, the river was still beautiful and it was an overall good experience. I would go again and recommend it to a friend but I would say to wait a while until the construction is done.
The last two places that I visited were the museums: COSI and the Columbus Art Museum. To get to each, I had to take a bus and walk for about fifteen minutes through the city and both had a lot of interesting things to see. At COSI, there were exhibits on space, electricity, and many other science related topics. I was particularly interested in the electricity related exhibit because electrical engineering is my major and it talked about the importance of not being wasteful with electricity, which directly relates to ENR Scholars. The art museum also had some very interesting exhibits, my favorite of which was a combination photograph of the sky at different times of the day. Unfortunately, I do not remember the name of the piece or the artist, but I do remember that, in order to make it, the artist had to take hundreds of photographs of the sky during all times of the day and in all types of weather. They then edited them seamlessly together in order to make one picture. This resulted in it looking like one big sky that was night, day, rainy, and clear all at once.
Finally, I watched the documentary Columbus Neighborhoods: Downtown & Franklinton and learned a lot about the history of Columbus. The most interesting thing that I learned was that early Columbus had a massive fire problem, with fires occurring every single day of the year. They happened so often that every citizen was required to have a leather fire bucket at their house and whenever a fire occurred in the area, they had to take their bucket and help put it out. Even this was not enough, so the city hired one of the only full time paid fire departments to help the citizens put out the city’s many fires. I also thought it was very interesting that the city had been asking for funding for a brick capital building for a long time and was not getting any, but then the old capital building caught fire and was replaced with a brick building. It is thought that the building was set ablaze by an “unknown” arsonist, which was funny to me.
Overall, I learned that Columbus is an extremely nice city with a lot of fun things to do and see and many delicious places to eat. I did not think that I would be interested in the Art Museum at first, but I fund that it was actually fun once I got there, so I would say to someone else trying to complete this assignment that they should keep an open mind and try something they have not done before because they might actually like it. I would also recommend that, if you are new to Columbus, you should get detailed directions before leaving and bring a smart phone if possible because construction is frequent and changes the bus schedules sometimes, which can make getting to your destination very tricky.