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Ok, here’s the deal. You’ve got a visitor from out of town. They’ve never been to Columbus. You want to show them a good time. Where do you take them, and what do you suggest they do while they’re here?
You’ve made your suggestions, and here’s the results!
The Top 10 Things to do While Visiting Columbus, Ohio
1) Stroll Through the Short North – Everyone seems to universally agree. The Short North is THE neighborhood to visit when you’re in Columbus. Go during a Gallery Hop if possible (first saturday of every month) but any day or night is a great time in the Short North. Be sure to hit a few of the art galleries, a few of the stores, and a few of the restaurants and bars. Special mentions go to Betty’s Fine Food and Spirits, The Surly Girl Saloon, the Bristol Bar, Skully’s Music Diner, Rosendale’s, and Goodale Park.
2) Lunch at the North Market – A short walk south of the Short North you’ll find the North Market. A great spot to shop for food, gifts, and try a variety of ethnic foods for lunch or to go. Special mentions to go Jeni’s Ice Cream and Pure Imagination Chocolatier.
3) Stroll Through German Village – This historic community on the southern end of downtown Columbus is filled with beautifully restored homes as well as a few well placed shops, stores, restaurants and more. Special mentions to go the Bookloft, Schiller Park, Banana Bean Cafe, and First Watch.
4) Tour the Franklin Park Conservatory – Located on Broad street a few miles east of downtown, the Park Conservatory is a great stop on any afternoon. Botanical exhibits feature a mix of plant-life and modern art. Attend during the summer months if possible for the annual butterfly exhibit.
5) Visit Easton Town Center – This shopping destination pioneered the “Lifestyle Center” concept and is still one of the most prime examples of it’s type anywhere in the country. Located just a few miles east of downtown, Easton combines standard shopping mall stores with a pedestrian-friendly outdoor setting. A mix of dining options, entertainment venues, and outdoor performance art during the summer makes it one of a kind stop in Columbus.
6) Tour the Ohio State University Campus – Columbus is home to one of the largest universities in the nation, and the campus is full of interesting activities for non-students and visitors. The commercial strip along High Street is famous for it’s stores, shops, and food options. Special mention also goes out to the Wexner Center for the Arts, where you can attend an event or view an exhibit while on campus.
7) Visit the Columbus Zoo – The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium is located approximately 20 miles north of downtown, but well worth the drive. Many of it’s exhibits have received national acclaim, and current expansion plans will increase the size of the zoo to make it one of the largest in North America.
8) Bar Hop in the Arena District – If you can visit Columbus during the winter hockey season you can take in a Blue Jackets game at Nationwide Arena, but the bars and restaurants in the Arena District are hopping all year long. All flavors of nightlife can be found through this area including sports bars, dance clubs, lounges, summer patios, local breweries, cocktails, DJs, live bands, national acts, local talents, and everything in between.
9) Visit the Columbus Museum of Art – The Art Museum is located right downtown and features a large collection of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American and European modern art. There are also rotating exhibits featured as well.
10) Go Out to Eat Constantly – Dining in Columbus gets it’s own special mention. Columbus may not be known for specific types of cuisine, but the sheer variety of options (most of which are very affordable) means that you should never been dining at home while visiting this city. The results of this poll showed that everyone’s got some pretty strong favorites. Some were already mentioned up above, and some others include M, Cap City, Spagio, Basi Italia, Northstar Cafe, Jack & Benny’s, Due Amici, and Latitude 41. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Agree with with just about all, though not so sure about the conservatory and wouldn’t do Easton. Especially if the visitor was from Europe, I’d be too embarassed to show them what we traded a real city for.
Obviously everyone’s going to have a different experience, but most of the European visitors I’ve known would go into a near-coronary seeing an American retail complex like Easton – a shopping frenzy even. Take them to a place like the outlet malls down in Jeffersonville and you’d better have an ambulance standing by.
My aunt and cousin come over from England about every other year and one of the first things they want to do is go to Easton because everything is so cheap to them and they view it as a very nice shopping place. FYI
My friend from Germany loves Easton. Most everyone else I’ve brought there from out of the country (or from this country) have really enjoyed it.
It’s hardly my favorite place to spend a normal afternoon, but it’s a pretty cool place to take people from out of town, IMO.
Don’t you mean you’d be too embarassed to show them what we traded a cornfield for?
I agree with pretty much everything said about this so far. Most visitors I host from out of town love going to Easton. This type of shopping experience was pioneered here in Columbus and is still one of the best “Lifestyle” centers in the country. Sure, it’s a fake little city, but it’s more unique than any other mall around here.
And sure, shopping in a downtown environment would be nicer, but it’s not really an option at the moment. And strolling through the Short North shops did rank #1 on the list while Easton ranked #5. So it’s seems like the people who voted on this list have their priorities in order.
8)
I haven’t had any visitors from Europe here, but my Canadian friends do love going to Easton.
Last summer I was looking at Columbus Monthly in a bookstore, their annual Best & Worst issue. Easton was voted “best place to take out of town guests.” I was kind of winding up to go into my hardcore urbanite scoffing mode at what sort of people think that’s the best Columbus has to offer –
– and then I remembered that I was at Easton. With a guest from Canada.
:oops:
(in no particular order)
1. downtown Columbus (the Statehouse, Lazarus Building, Supreme Court, Arena District, Miranova, County Courthouse, Museum of Art)
2. neighborhoods (German Village, Short North, Clintonville, Victorian Village, Olde Towne East, Campus areas)
3. OSU (the campus, adjacent areas, Wexner Center, South Campus Gateway)
4. Franklin Park Conservatory
5. our freeways (I-270/OH 161 construction zone, the new I-670, the downtown split at rush hour, I-71 coming north from Grove City which has an awesome view of the city, I-270/OH 315/North High Street at evening rush hour, I-270 by Easton)
6. Easton, Polaris, Tuttle Crossing
7. the Columbus Zoo
8. our delectable selection of food (White Castle, Wendys, Cheryl and Co. cookies, Max and Erma’s, Schmidts, and the truly fine restaurants in Columbus)
9. a tour of the suburbs (Upper Arlington and Bexley for Old Money, New Albany and Dublin for New Money)
10. our abundance of golf courses
Foreign visitors do like Easton a lot, now that many people have mentioned it; my family and I had family from Germany come over in August 1989 when City Center opened and they loved it, especially all the fancy stores and shiny new mall stuff!
Well, instead of places, I’m going to post my favorite events since everyone pretty much covered everything.
1. Holiday Hop
2. Comfest
3. Jazz & Rib fest
4. Red, White & Boom
5. Gallery Hop
6. OSU v Michigan
7. Latin Festival
8. italian festival/octoberfest
That’s all I can think of right now.
I am sure most would have this on their stroll of the short north, but I take everyone by the i670 cap at teh bare minimum. This honestly might be one of the greatest items in columbus.
Ugh. Sitting in rush hour traffic? I don’t think our traffic is anything worth seeing. :lol: Or at least maybe I just don’t think it’s worth it for $3.29 a gallon.
Ha! That was actually going to be the next one of these Top 10s. ;)
I’ve been thinking about this little sidebar for a couple days, and had to respond. I think the anecdotes people gave effectively rebuted this, but I think it’s interesting to consider why our guts sometimes tell us that Europeans do everything better.
But in my experience, the Europeans I’ve worked with are really just not that much different than us. They rent when they’re single, are more urban at the time, and when they finally get married and start a family they buy out in the country. There’s a McDonald’s in any big city, and tourists aren’t the only customers. They have WalMart. And they still flock to L.A., probably the antithesis of European cities.
I mean, on this website we are skewed because we have a disproportionate interest in urban planning and are conscious of its ramifications on a regular basis. I think many people here would be surprised just how many “average joes” there are in Europe that board public transportation just cuz it’s there as opposed to having an air of “mixed-use, pro-environmental, pro-density” each time they step onto a train.
My point is, I admire Europe immensely and think we can learn a lot from their cities. But to elevate the people there to some higher level simply because fate placed them there is hardly warranted. I, for one, enjoy the challenge of being part of the generation that will be driving Columbus’ urban environment. :wink:
I agree with both of these sentiments. I think it’s easy to give credit, or form a belief, about the whole, especially when it comes to “Europe” and “Europeans.” I’ve often wondered about this tendancy and why it happens. Because I think in the end, there are just as many people in europe who exhibit the same or similar negative tendancies as people in the US. But for some reason Europe gets overly idealized.
More importantly however, I second the last statement. I feel, as I know a large % of people on this board do, that we stand at the edge of something potentially great for columbus. And I’m excited to be in a position to help drive and shape that something.
Sorry for digressing; to bring it full circle, I will say that pretty much everything i’d list in my own top10 has already been mentioned.
Not all of these are in Columbus, but here’s 101 Thinigs to do in Ohio.
Their Columbus nods include COSI, The Short North, Jeni’s @ The North Market, CBC, and Festival Latino.
Really? That’s it? :?
possibly the most entertaining thing I’ve done in a long while.
not everyone is a dog lover… or even pets in general 8)
Hmm.. kind of a weak showing from Columbus, but I guess they DID want to try and give options for ALL OVER Ohio, not just the big cities… (that said, there are at least EIGHT Cleveland destinations in the list).
no, you’re right,
I’ve been thinking about this little sidebar for a couple days, and had to respond. I think the anecdotes people gave effectively rebuted this
I really doubt that any European would rather turn their city into a parking lot and have a fake one miles outside in a grassfield. When you factor that in, and how could you not, it is embarassing. I’m checking out a couple of photo books of old Columbus and it’s just frustrating to see what we traded our beautiful, pedestrian friendly buildings for.
Oh and it’s not just Europeans, though I use them as an example because I spent a lot of time there. I’d rather we were a lot more like Canadians. Go visit some Canadian downtowns and then ours.
care to elaborate? i’m curious as to what makes canadian downtowns something to aspire to.