Jan and I are traveling to Grand Rapids, Michigan for a conference called the Retail Success Summit. We are looking forward to a little bit of R&R and some great retail inspiration - Robyn is joining us on Sunday.
We left Edmonton at 8 am on Friday, June 27, 2014. On a side note, as we were leaving Edmonton we saw the largest plane in the world with six engines - the Antonov 225 - on the tarmac - it was delivering a piece of equipment for a fertilizer plant in Redwater. We flew to Dallas and then back up to Grand Rapids, Michigan. I usually make fun of people to make these awkward connections but it was actually shorter time-wise than flying through Chicago. We did see several people wearing overalls in Dallas, Texas - wasn't sure that they were still in style, but I guess they are. I will be looking for a short version in Michigan! We arrived at the Amway Grand Plaza in the downtown area (Grand Rapids is the world headquarters for Amway) about 7 pm. We wandered around downtown for a while and then stopped at San Chez Tapas for dinner. It was excellent! We had seared Ahi tuna, chicken and chorizo, pickled watermelon salad, potato/cheese croquettes, olives, calamari.bacon, whiskey soaked cake and tres leche (three milk) cake along with a carafe of Sangria. So good.
On Saturday, we slept in until 11 am - WHAT!!! That is about 5 hours past Bob's usual wake up time. We went for coffee at Mad Cap Cafe and had a "flight of coffee" - 3 extremely impressive coffees - we were told. It was ok. We then watched a bike race and and walked around downtown for awhile. We stopped at Hop Cat Brewery for lunch - this is the #1 Brewpub in the USA. I had a couple of belgian style beers (one form Michigan and one from Belgium) and Jan had a raspberry beer - all delicious. We had some food too. Jan asked where we might find a store for some hand cream and we were directed to "Lucky" a few blocks away. As we arrived at Lucky, there were several homeless people hanging around. We walked in and out very quickly - Jan decided she did not want to ask the guy behind the cage/cashier where the hand cream was. We walked back to the hotel and stopped at GP Sports Bar to watch the end of the Brazil/Chile soccer game - had another beer while Jan had a coffee and peanut butter pie. Went for an unremarkable dinner at Sundance Grill and then back to San Chez for dessert. Jan had a chocolate concoction and I had a flight of port. They sure like their "fights" here. Home to bed.
On Sunday, we slept in again. Had coffee at Starbucks and then off to San Chez Bistro (clearly our favourite place in Grand Rapids) for lunch. We sat next to Motley Crue who are here for a show on July 2. Great lunch and then off to GP Sports Bar to catch the end of the Netherlands/Mexico game - a nail biter. Read a book in the massive lobby for a while.
Robyn arrives late Sunday night and then we attended the Retail Success Summit for 2 days. Amazing conference and we each left with 30 pages of notes and 4 pages of point form action items. Our plane was delayed leaving Grand Rapids so we missed our connection in Chicago. We spent the night at the Hilton Airport and left the next morning.
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