We went to Columbus, Ohio, at the end of May for another travel volleyball weekend, which meant the usual combination of hotel logistics, convention center walking, team schedules, tournament brackets, restaurant decisions, and parents trying to figure out how to eat actual food at strange hours. By this point in the travel volleyball season, we had become pretty used to the rhythm of these weekends. You drive to some city, find the hotel, figure out where the girls need to be, sit in a giant building full of volleyball courts, and then somehow try to squeeze in meals, sleep, and maybe a little exploring if the schedule allows it.
This trip, though, had its own personality right from the start. Before we even left Grand Rapids, we had a hotel room problem. Then we had a route-planning session with my friend Mike, also known as MG Navigator. Then we had cheap Indiana gas, my first-ever valet parking experience at age fifty, an unexpected giant hotel suite, a Saturday night restaurant experience that started with laser lights and artificial smoke and ended with authentic Mexican street tacos, and finally a Buckeye fan who wanted no part of my University of Michigan hat.
So, yes, technically this was a volleyball trip. But like most of these weekends, the volleyball was only part of the story.
The Hotel Room Problem Before We Even Left
The first issue popped up on Thursday, the day before we were supposed to leave. Susie had booked our hotel months earlier at the Renaissance by Marriott in downtown Columbus, within walking distance of the convention center where the volleyball tournament would be held. She had booked a room with two queen beds, which made perfect sense because there were three of us traveling: Susie, Elena, and me.
Thankfully, Susie decided to open the Marriott app one more time to confirm everything before we left. That is when she noticed our room now showed one queen bed, with no sofa bed and no roll-away bed option. One queen bed for three people is not a room arrangement. That is a test of patience, marriage, parenting, spinal alignment, and probably a few other things I am not qualified to diagnose.
Susie called the hotel and found out that because we had booked the room using the exclusive friends-and-family discount option, our exact reservation type was not guaranteed. The hotel was able to switch us to a king room with the possibility of a roll-away bed, which was not ideal but would at least work. They also said there might be a chance to upgrade to a suite if one was still available when we arrived, but they could not give us that option over the phone. We had to be there in person.
That created some urgency for Friday. Elena had school. Susie had to work a half day. And I had to make it very clear to FedEx that getting me out of work on time was going to be important. I told them I needed to be out by 1 PM, knowing full well that 1 PM probably meant closer to 2 PM in real FedEx time. Sure enough, they got me out at 1:45, which was close enough to what I expected that I could not complain too much.
Elena got home from school around 3 PM, we got everything loaded up, and we pulled out of the driveway almost exactly at 4 PM. We had roughly five hours of drive time ahead of us, and we were hoping to get to Columbus early enough to have some kind of chance at improving the room situation. At this point, I was still picturing a king bed and a roll-away bed, which was not glamorous but seemed manageable.
MG Navigator and the Indiana Gas Tax Blessing
Before we left, I called my friend Mike to get some advice on the best route to Columbus. Mike has in-laws near Columbus and travels there pretty often with his family. He is also a truck driver, but not your average truck driver. His initials are MG, and I call him MG Navigator because he is basically a human GPS with a CDL and better instincts than Google Maps.
Mike can rattle off highways, exit numbers, traffic trouble spots, travel stops, and little road details from memory like he is reading them off a screen, except he is not looking at anything. I asked him about the drive from Grand Rapids to Columbus, and he suggested we take I-69 down toward Fort Wayne, then head east on US-30 from there. The other option would have taken us toward Ann Arbor and then down US-23 into Columbus, but Mike warned us that we would probably hit rush-hour traffic near Ann Arbor and then deal with a stretch of US-23 north of Columbus that apparently has about fifty traffic lights.
That was enough for me. A route with the same ETA that avoids Ann Arbor rush hour and fifty traffic lights is a route I am going to take. I checked Google Maps afterward, and sure enough, Mike’s route had basically the same arrival time as the Ann Arbor route. It is always nice when Google Maps confirms what MG Navigator already knew from whatever strange road atlas he apparently keeps inside his brain.
Mike also told us that Indiana had a statewide gas tax holiday going on that weekend, which immediately made the Indiana route even more appealing. He recommended stopping at the Love’s Travel Stop in Angola, Indiana, which was about two hours from our house. That turned out to be perfect because it gave us cheaper gas, clean restrooms, and a Hardee’s attached to the travel stop for a quick food stop.
We filled up for $3.43 per gallon in Indiana, while Michigan prices were hovering around $4.50 per gallon. Susie shared the information with the volleyball moms in their group chat, and several families followed the same route and enjoyed the cheaper gas, too. As soon as we crossed into Ohio, gas prices climbed right back above $4, closer to what we had been seeing in Michigan. So, thank you, Indiana, for briefly making us feel like we had stepped back into a slightly less ridiculous economic timeline.
Valet Parking, Room Confusion, and the Suite Nobody Saw Coming
One of Elena’s teammates, Jocelyn, and her family had originally booked a hotel that they thought was downtown, but it turned out not to be as close to the convention center as they expected. Susie found another room available through the Marriott app and booked it so they could stay at our hotel and be within walking distance of the tournament with the rest of us. So, by the time we arrived in Columbus around 9:45 PM, we had a two-room situation that we hoped would work out for everybody.
Naturally, it did not work out the way we thought it would. Both rooms had king beds, and neither room had a roll-away bed available. That meant we had six people total: four adults and two teenage volleyball players, with two king beds between us. That might work in some kind of weird survival challenge, but it was not the plan for a volleyball tournament weekend.
Susie found the manager she had spoken with earlier about our original room issue, and they started working on a solution. Meanwhile, Elena and I stayed outside by our giant Ford Expedition, parked directly in the valet lane, because the hotel was valet parking only. I did not want to hand over the vehicle until Susie came back out and made sure she had everything she needed from it. This meant Elena and I stood there for more than thirty minutes, unintentionally clogging up the valet lane like we were important people instead of confused Michiganders with too much luggage.
This was also my first-ever lifetime experience with valet parking. I am fifty years old and had never used valet before this trip. So while we waited, I chatted with the valet crew and asked them about tipping etiquette because I honestly had no idea how any of it worked. One of the valet attendants told me that people typically tip when they drop off the car and again when they pick it up, and that the average tip is around five dollars. She also made sure to let me know we could tip whatever amount we wanted, depending on how generous we were feeling, which was a smooth move on her part.
After we had been blocking the lane for half an hour, I gave them ten dollars. It seemed fair considering they had been patient, friendly, and had not once made me feel like the country cousin who accidentally wandered into a downtown hotel situation he did not understand. Eventually, Susie came back out with the news that the hotel had figured out a solution. And somehow, after all the confusion, we ended up with three rooms for the price of two.
One of the rooms was a suite connected to another regular king room, and the third room was just down the hall. The suite was enormous. It had a king-size Murphy bed, a full-size glass table with six chairs, a full-size refrigerator, a small kitchenette, multiple chairs and seating areas, and a sliding glass door that opened onto the fourth-floor outdoor terrace next to the hotel pool. The hotel itself was fifteen stories, but the “rooftop” pool was actually on the fourth floor, which is apparently how we define rooftops now. I am not here to argue with marketing departments.
The suite looked like the kind of place where people in movies wear fancy clothes, drink cocktails, and close business deals. Instead, we gave it to Elena and Jocelyn, two teenage volleyball players, with the idea that they could use it as a hangout space if their teammates had time to come over. Susie and I took the connecting regular room, and Mali and Charlie took the room down the hall. After starting with a reservation problem that looked like it might ruin the hotel setup entirely, we somehow ended up with the best possible arrangement.
A Hotel Bar Bill That Solved That Mystery Quickly
After we finally got settled into our rooms, the girls stayed up in the suite, and the adults headed downstairs to the hotel bar for a nightcap. Susie and I each had two drinks, and our total bill was over seventy dollars. That was for four small drinks, not dinner, not appetizers, not some rare bottle of anything hand-delivered by monks from a European mountain village.
That hotel bar made its point quickly. We were not going to be doing much drinking there the rest of the weekend. It is one thing to pay a little extra for convenience when you are staying downtown. It is another thing to order four small drinks and feel like you should get reward points, a commemorative glass, and possibly partial ownership in the bar.
We ended up getting to bed around 1 AM, which was not ideal, but at least the girls were scheduled for the afternoon wave on Saturday. That meant we did not have to be up at the crack of dawn for volleyball right away. We could move a little slower in the morning, drink some questionable in-room coffee, and pretend we were rested.
Saturday Morning Coffee and a Walk Around Columbus
Saturday morning started with us moseying around the hotel rooms, getting showers done, and drinking coffee from the in-room coffee maker. Eventually, Susie and I decided to head down to the lobby to see if there were better coffee options available. I was hoping for the classic hotel setup: complimentary coffee somewhere with a few flavored creamers, maybe enough caffeine to convince my body it had slept longer than it had.
Unfortunately, there was no complimentary coffee setup waiting for us. So we wandered outside and decided to walk around a few blocks without using Google Maps. This is a risky move in modern life, because apparently, humans are no longer supposed to find anything without a glowing rectangle telling us where to turn. But we went old-school and just started walking.
A few blocks from the hotel, we found a place called Cure Coffee and Cocktails. They had me at “coffee.” It was only around 10 in the morning, so the cocktail half of the name was not really calling my name yet. I had brought my FedEx travel coffee mug with me, and they agreed to fill it with coffee, cream, and one of their in-house flavored syrups. I went with caramel, and it was good.
After coffee, we walked back to the hotel and met Elena and Jocelyn in the lobby. The girls were looking for breakfast, and the hotel had a buffet that was actually pretty impressive. It had all the usual breakfast options, plus a guy behind the counter ready to cook custom omelets. The pricing was fair too: $24 for adults and $11 for kids fifteen and under. Susie was not very hungry, so I ate breakfast with Elena and Jocelyn while she headed back upstairs.
After breakfast, the girls dismissed themselves back to their suite, and I went for a short walk around downtown Columbus by myself. This time, I walked in the opposite direction from where Susie and I had gone for coffee. I passed restaurants and shops, wandered down an alley, and walked through some kind of historical memorial park with statues of presidents and American war heroes that must have had a connection to the area.
The weather was perfect. For the last weekend in May in Columbus, Ohio, it was about as good as you could ask for. I was comfortable in shorts and a t-shirt; there was no humidity in the air, and it was not too hot. Sometimes a city gets bonus points just because it catches you on the right weather day, and Columbus definitely did that on Saturday morning.
The Pool Plan That Turned Into Tip Top
Eventually, I made my way back up to the room. Susie was getting ready to go sit out on the terrace near the pool, so I grabbed the book I had brought with me and joined her. The plan was simple: sit outside, relax, maybe read a little, and enjoy a little calm before the long afternoon of volleyball.
When we got out there, Mali and Charlie were sitting at a table, so we joined them and started chatting. They had worked out that morning and had not eaten breakfast yet, so they wanted to find somewhere nearby for lunch. Just like that, the quiet pool-and-book plan turned into a restaurant plan, which is how travel weekends work. You think you are going to relax, then somebody says they are hungry, and suddenly the book is just a prop you carried around for no reason.
We ended up going to a nearby tavern-style restaurant called Tip Top. Mali and Charlie had lunch, Susie had a drink, and I had a soda. It was nothing dramatic, just good conversation and a casual meal before the volleyball portion of the day took over. After that, we headed back to the hotel to gather up the girls and start the walk to the convention center.
The Convention Center and a Whole Lot of Volleyball
The walk from the hotel to the Greater Columbus Convention Center was about twenty-two minutes. A bunch of us walked together, which always makes those walks feel shorter. When we arrived, the place was exactly what you expect from a major travel volleyball tournament: players everywhere, parents everywhere, coaches carrying clipboards, girls in matching warmups, folding chairs, backpacks, coolers, court numbers, whistles, and the low roar of a few thousand people all existing in one giant building.
There were somewhere around sixty or seventy courts at the tournament. With four teams on each court and roughly nine to twelve girls per team, the math gets ridiculous pretty quickly. Add in coaches, parents, families, officials, and tournament staff, and you are dealing with a small temporary volleyball city. At this point in the season, we had become pretty accustomed to the chaos. The girls enjoy the team camaraderie, and the parents enjoy each other’s company while cheering them on.
On Saturday, Rise Academy ended up on a court with three other teams that were very evenly matched. Almost every match on that court went to a third set, meaning each team split the first two sets and had to play one more to decide the winner. That made everything take longer, and our court started falling behind schedule almost immediately. This is one of those things that sounds small until you are sitting in a convention center, realizing dinner is slowly moving farther and farther away from you.
My cousin Molly was there too because her daughter Tessa was playing with her Legacy team. We had previously seen them at a tournament in Pontiac, and their court in Columbus was not far from ours on Saturday. I spent some time watching Tessa’s team play and visiting with Molly, and Molly and Tony came over to watch some of Elena’s Rise matches when they had the chance.
That has become one of the unexpected things I appreciate about travel volleyball. I do not see that side of the family very often anymore. Maybe a family get-together once every few years, if that. But because our daughters play travel volleyball, we sometimes end up in the same giant building in another city, watching them play on courts a few rows apart. It is strange how life works that way.
Rise finished Saturday pool play with two wins and one loss. The loss was a close one in the third set and could have gone either way. Even with the loss, they finished second in the pool, which secured a spot in the Gold Bracket for Sunday. That was huge because the Gold Bracket started at 8 AM, while the Silver Bracket did not start until 3 PM. Since we had a five-hour drive home to Grand Rapids after Sunday play, an early start was a very good thing.
The Alley Burger Experience
Because we were in the afternoon wave, we did not leave the convention center until close to 9 PM on Saturday night. A group of us wanted to find somewhere to eat and maybe have a drink, but we did not really know what would still be open and serving food that late. I remembered seeing a place called Alley Burger during my morning walk, and it looked kind of cool. The entrance was literally in an alley between tall buildings, and it was not far from our hotel.
So we walked there. Our group had six adults and four teenage girls, which is not exactly a small group to bring into a restaurant late on a Saturday night. When we walked into Alley Burger, we were greeted by loud hip-hop techno music, artificial smoke, laser lights, and not a single customer in the place. It was 9 PM on a Saturday night in downtown Columbus, and the place had the atmosphere of a nightclub hosting a private event for nobody.
There was one worker behind the bar, and she told us to sit wherever we wanted. We sat at a couple of large tables near each other, and she eventually brought waters and took our drink orders. Since she was by herself, everything took a while. That was understandable at first, but it became increasingly clear that this was going to be an unusual dining experience.
The laminated menus were not encouraging. The food options sounded fine, but the menus themselves looked worn and grimy in that way that makes you start mentally lowering your expectations. Still, you never know. Sometimes the best food comes from questionable circumstances, and we were already there. It was late, we were hungry, and there did not appear to be a better option magically waiting around the corner.
We placed our food orders and then slowly nursed our drinks because it was obvious they were not going to be refilled anytime soon. The waitress was not very attentive after the drink order, and we just waited. And waited. After nearly an hour, a woman we had not seen before came to the table and introduced herself as the manager.
That is when we learned the griddle was not working. Apparently, someone had been trying to fix it the entire time we were sitting there. We thought our food was being prepared, but in reality, no burgers were being cooked at Alley Burger because Alley Burger could not currently cook burgers. The manager was very apologetic, comped our drinks, and offered us 30% off next time we came in. We explained that we were only in town for one more night and that there probably would not be a next time.
Right Around the Corner, Several Corners Later
The manager then made a call to a taco place that was apparently connected to Alley Burger, possibly owned by the same person or group. She confirmed they were still open and could serve us food. She told us it was literally right around the corner, which turned out to be a very flexible interpretation of the phrase “right around the corner.”
She started to explain how to get there, then abruptly decided she would just walk us there herself and make sure we were treated right. She also promised us a 20% discount on our food at the taco place. At that point, we were tired and hungry enough to follow almost anyone promising tacos.
Right around the corner ended up being several blocks, several actual corners, a questionable alley, a parking lot, and another street. It felt less like walking to a nearby restaurant and more like being led through a side quest in downtown Columbus. We finally arrived around 10:30 PM, and just like Alley Burger, we were the only customers in the place.
There was one guy behind the bar, and he did not look thrilled to see a party of ten walk in after the kitchen had already been cleaned. We could hear someone in the back talking, and at one point, that person clearly said they had already cleaned everything for the night. I understood their pain. Nobody wants ten hungry volleyball people showing up after the mop has already made its appearance.
To his credit, the guy behind the bar took care of us. He was not overly excited at first, but after hearing the story of what happened at Alley Burger, he seemed to warm up to the situation a bit. The manager from Alley Burger also stayed for a while to make sure they were going to serve us and take care of us properly.
The food ended up being really good. It was authentic Mexican-style tacos and other Mexican dishes, and I ordered basic street tacos. After waiting for almost an hour at the restaurant where nothing was being cooked, those tacos tasted fantastic. I also had a Stella Artois with the meal, and after the long day we had, that beer hit the spot.
My Michigan Hat in Enemy Territory
Near the end of the meal, an older Black man walked in with two of his friends and sat at the bar near our table. Based on the conversations we overheard, we figured out that he was the owner of both locations. At some point, he turned around and noticed my navy blue hat with the maize-colored block M on the front.
Before saying anything else, he exclaimed, “Oh, hell no!”
We were in Columbus, Ohio, after all. I knew I was wearing enemy colors, but sometimes you just have to live your truth. The man was a diehard Ohio State fan, and he said his reason for living was to hate that team from up north. He refused to even say the word Michigan, as if uttering it would violate some deeply held religious belief.
I had fun with it. We joked back and forth for a bit and talked college sports. It was the perfect ending to a meal we never expected to have in the first place. We thanked him for staying open for us, paid our bill, and although the discount ended up being closer to 5% than the promised 20%, nobody really cared at that point. We had finally eaten.
I way over-tipped the guy who served us because I knew we had probably ruined the end of his night. He had every reason to be annoyed that a party of ten showed up after the kitchen was basically cleaned, but overall, he handled it pretty well. We walked back to the hotel tired, full, and very aware that we had to be back at the convention center by 7 AM for an 8 AM game.
Gold Bracket Sunday
Sunday morning came quickly. The girls had to play at 8 AM, which meant arriving at the convention center around 7 AM. Mali and Charlie ordered an Uber and let us tag along, which was much better than walking twenty-plus minutes through downtown that early in the morning. I like walking, but not every walk needs to be a character-building exercise.
Rise came out strong and won the first Gold Bracket match pretty handily. Then they lost their second match, and again it was close and went to three sets. Losing that second match meant they no longer had a chance to win the championship, but for whatever reason, the bracket still had them scheduled to play one more match at noon. It was basically a consolation game, but the girls played it and won.
So the weekend finished with Rise going 2-1 on Saturday during pool play and 2-1 again on Sunday during tournament play. No championship this time, but a 4-2 weekend is nothing to be ashamed of. Overall, it was another good travel volleyball weekend, with plenty of competition, plenty of team camaraderie, and just enough chaos to make the trip memorable.
Late Checkout and Little Jesus Figurines
Luckily, our Marriott Bonvoy Gold status gave us late checkout. We left the convention center around 1 PM, walked back to the hotel, and had about half an hour to pack everything up and get checked out by 2 PM. The front desk even told us we had a fifteen-minute buffer if we needed it, but we still checked out almost exactly at 2.
While double-checking the rooms to make sure we had not left anything behind, I purposely left a couple of little Jesus figurines around the room for housekeeping or the next guests to find. This is one of my quirky little ways of trying to spread the love of Jesus. The little figures have a sash across the front that says “Jesus Loves You,” except it uses a heart symbol for the word loves.
It is a small thing, and maybe somebody finds one and smiles. Maybe somebody finds one and thinks, “What kind of person leaves tiny Jesus figurines in hotel rooms?” Either way, they are not wrong to wonder. But I like the idea of leaving behind a little unexpected reminder that Jesus loves them, even in a downtown Columbus hotel room after a weekend full of volleyball players, valet parking, and overpriced cocktails.
Jeni’s, More Indiana Gas, and a Taco Bell Callback
We drove home almost the same way we came, except we made one small detour through Dublin, Ohio, to visit a Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream shop. Mali had recommended it, and there were several locations around Columbus. We decided to hit the road first and find one along our route home instead of going back into downtown.
The ice cream did not disappoint. I can see why people make a big deal out of Jeni’s. It was a nice final treat before settling into the long drive back to Michigan.
From there, we headed toward the same Love’s Travel Stop in Indiana that we had used on the way down. I wanted to fill up in Indiana one more time and take advantage of the cheaper gas while the gas tax holiday was still going. There was also a Taco Bell at the same exit, which gave us one final ironic food moment for the trip.
The night before, a couple of Elena’s teammates had left the group while we were being led through downtown by the Alley Burger manager and went back to the hotel to order Taco Bell. They did not want to wait, which I understood. They ended up with late-night Taco Bell, and we ended up with authentic Mexican street tacos. Both versions have their place in the world, but I think we got the better deal that night.
Then on the way home Sunday, we ended up getting Taco Bell ourselves. It was good, because Taco Bell is usually good in the way Taco Bell is good. But I definitely enjoyed the street tacos the night before a little more. That feels like a fair and balanced food review from a man who enjoys both authentic tacos and whatever category of food Taco Bell technically belongs to.
Another Volleyball Weekend in the Books
The rest of the drive home was smooth, and we arrived back in Grand Rapids around 8 PM. We had work and school waiting for us on Monday morning, which is always the cruel little ending to a weekend trip. One minute you are eating ice cream in Dublin, Ohio, and the next you are unpacking luggage and thinking about alarms.
Columbus ended up being a good trip. We did not do a ton of sightseeing, and we did not really have time to explore the city the way we might on a normal family trip. But that is how volleyball weekends work. You see a city in pieces: a hotel lobby, a convention center, a few sidewalks, a coffee shop, a restaurant that cannot cook your food, a taco place that saves the night, and whatever you can catch through the windshield on the way home.
The funny thing is, those little pieces are usually enough. The hotel debacle turned into a giant suite. The route advice turned into cheaper gas and a smoother drive. The failed burger stop turned into tacos, beer, and a Buckeye fan giving me grief for wearing a Michigan hat. The volleyball weekend did what these weekends often do: it gave us a reason to go somewhere, and then the somewhere gave us a story.
Another tournament weekend behind us. Another city added to the list. Another reminder that the stuff you remember most from a trip is often the stuff nobody planned.