Apr 9, 2025 - Apr 29, 2025
Last updated: 5/9/25 1:00pm PT
This did not start out as a Hall of Fame Tour. The planning for this trip began with “let’s go back to Niagara Falls”. Both of us had seen the falls as kids, and we wanted to see it again as adults – to appreciate it more. Since we try to avoid flights with connections, our choices were to fly to Newark NJ or Washington DC. We also wanted to visit a few states we hadn’t set foot in yet, like Delaware, Maryland and West Virginia, so either of those two airports would work.
When I thought about driving from Newark to Niagara, I remembered that the Baseball Hall of Fame is kinda sorta in between the two. It wasn’t a bucket list item by any means, but it seemed unlikely we’d ever be this close again, so why not pay a visit. Denise remembered that the Hockey Hall of Fame was in Toronto, and that’s not too far from Niagara Falls, so we added that to the list. Then we got silly; why not go to Cleveland and see the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Suddenly this turned into a Hall of Fame Tour.
As we were finding things to do along the way, Denise found a factory tour at the Fanny May chocolate company in Canton, OH (on the drive between Pittsburgh and Cleveland) very near the Football Hall of Fame. Since neither of us follows football anymore, we chose not to go inside this hall of fame, but we stopped in the parking lot for a selfie. (The Basketball HOF is in the middle of Massachusetts, too far out of the way for a photo op)
Trip Stats: 2,683 total miles driven, 8 states and 1 province (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Ontario), entered 3 halls of fame and drove past a 4th, added 3 more states to our ‘done’ list, and rode 2 funiculars.
NOTE: Funiculars aren't a "thing", at least not yet. But now we've ridden them in 4 countries: Pittsburgh (USA) and Niagara Falls, ON (Canada), Orvieto (Italy), Guanajuato (Mexico), and an honorable mention to the one we saw in Des Moines, Iowa but couldn't ride because it was closed