Miquel 8/14/19 Miquel 8/14/19

24 Hours in Kansas City - What to see and what to do?

Visiting some amazing museums in the heart of the Midwest

The Midwest is often snubbed by those living on both coasts of North America, as “flyover country”.

And I must confess that, until recently I was not at all inmune to this stereotype. So, when I was invited to attend a work gig in Kansas, I did not really know what to expect.

Yet, a day in Kansas City (that, by the way, is not located in the state of Kansas, but just across the state line in Missouri!) sufficed to dispel any such notions as totally inaccurate.

In fact, as soon as I started to put together my own research and the tips I got from my local contacts it started to become obvious that the full day I had allocated for sightseeing may not be enough...by quite some way.

My impression of Kansas City is that it is a city of museums...and some rather unique ones at that. Whether you are into military history, aviation history, American history you have come to the right place.

In my case, I had only a limited amount of time in the city, so I had to prioritise.

When looking at the main attractions in Kansas City, the National WW1 Museum and Memorial was a must (since I had included it in this list of great military museums that I compiled for CNN ) and, given my interest in commercial aviation, so were the TWA Museum and the National Airline History Museum.

At the very last minute, I also decided to visit the Arabia Steamboat Museum, that did not disappoint.

This meant there was no time left for some other items in my to-do list, such as the Nelson-Atkins art museum or the money museum at the Federal Reserve of Kansas City.

But, well…they say you should always leave something for the next visit!

So here is my list of what to do in Kansas City

Downtown
National WW1 Museum and Memorial
City Market and Steamboat Arabia
TWA Museum

Downtown Kansas City

Like so many other cities in America, Kansas City has glass and steel downtown. Nothing special here.

But, what other cities possibly lack is the sort of privileged vantage point offered by another of Kansas City’s landmarks, the National WW1 Museum and Memorial (more on this later) and its tower (whose height adds to the museum’s already elevated position, on top of a hill).

Once you are up there, looking at the lights of the city, any sense of coldness and impersonality in contemporary American architecture fades way. There is always something mesmerizing about this type of skyline.

If looking at downtown Kansas City from the WW1 museum, one particular building dominates the scene. It is not a high rise tower, but the massive classical-style building of Union Station, built in 1914, a vestige of the time, well before the idea of “flyover country” came into being, when Kansas City played an important role in the transcontinental rail network.

Above are a couple of interesting “steampunk”-style pieces of street decor near Union Station

The National WW1 Museum and Memorial

This is, simply put, the museum of reference about WW1 in America.

The museum was set up in 1926 by popular subscription, the tower and adjacent pavilions are from that time. It was, however, vastly renovated a decade ago.

The granitic, solid look of the museum grounds, and its majestic location, on a hill overlooking downtown Kansas City and surrounded by vast green open spaces, give it a, quite fitting, solemn aspect.

The museum is structured around a tower, whose top floor, still open to visitors today, was, for many decades, the highest point in hundreds of miles around.

Some of the key allied commanders in WW1 met all together for the first time in Kansas City after the war

national world war one museum kansas city.JPG

An interesting feature of this museum is that, unlike other war museums, it depicts the conflict in its entirety, in a purely chronological manner, instead of focusing only on the American point of view.

Also, pretty much all items in the museum are original and have come from the many different fronts of WW1, often via donations from individual collectors.

The exhibits go from the macro, societal level aspects of the war, all the way down to the many gripping personal stories, as well as some curious facts about the war.

I found personally interesting the story of a guy that, in the course of the conflict, fought successively, and in the same area of the front for, both, the Germans and, after successfully deserting and immigrating to America, for the US. Here displ… — I found personally interesting the story of a guy that, in the course of the conflict, fought successively, and in the same area of the front for, both, the Germans and, after successfully deserting and immigrating to America, for the US. Here displayed are the two different uniforms he wore.

The museum also regularly organizes temporary exhibits covering specific aspects of the conflict. When I visited there was an interesting exhibit about handicrafts produced by people that were involved in the conflict.

But, perhaps one of the most remarkable items, at least for me, is the painting Pantheon de Guerre.

This is a rather unique piece of art, since it is said to have been the largest painting ever completed. When it was whole (only part of it is preserved), it covered the same area as a football field.

Pantheon de Guerre, that was completed shortly after the war, depicts over 6,000 characters, real and allegorical, representing the victorious nations and its leaders. Quite conveniently, it is possible to check who is who in the painting with the assistance of some electronic displays located throughout the hall.

As a bonus, I visited during the week of “Taps at the Tower”. A memorial taps ceremony, with a bugler and flags is performed at sunset every day during a whole week (weather permitting!). At the end of the ceremony, it is possible to get up the tower for a nocturnal view of Kansas City’s skyline.

City Market

The sloping area between downtown and the Missouri river is home to the City Market, an open square (with parking space at its center).

This space is lined by fresh food shops and restaurants offering different cuisines from around the world.

On certain days there is an outdoor market too, hence the name of the place!

At first glance, it looks like City Market and the adjacent streets are a sort of small pedestrianised (a somehow “hipsterish”) enclave in Kansas City

The Steamboat Arabia Museum

It is also here that you will find one of Kansas City’s most interesting and unsuspected finds (in this case, quite literally!): the Steamboat Arabia.

The Arabia was a paddle steamboat was one of many that plied America’s waterways in the pre-Civil War era. Navigation in the American frontier was far from safe and sinkings were a relatively frequent occurrence.

This is what happened to the Arabia, on one night of 1856, when it hit a drifting log (when floating in the downstream current logs can be dangerous to ships, like a torpedo of sorts!) and sunk.

In fact, it did not sink immediately, but it settled slowly in a mudflat a few miles upstream from Kansas City. All passengers could be safely evacuated, but not its cargo.

And this is what makes the Arabia so interesting.

Our passionate guide, a former Marines officer and distant relative of president Van Buren!

The anaerobic environment in which it sunk helped preserve in (almost) mint state the 200 tons of goods that it carried onboard. Mainly merchandise to re-supply stores serving newly created settlements upstream in the frontier. In short, it was the 1850s equivalent of a “floating Wal-Mart”, a time capsule of what life was like at that time for ordinary Americans.

The location of the wreck was lost shortly after it went down, but in the 1980s a team of entrepreneurial enthusiasts set to locate it. And this they did, in 1988.

As soon as the hull was found, efforts started to recover it and salvage its contents.

The museum is the result of this private enterprise. It is not large, but very well organized and the exhibits are quite impressive, as most of the items are in mint condition.

There is an impressive array of tableware, tools, clothes, footwear, weapons and even some relatively well preserved canned sardines (although still whole, I confirmed that no one actually dared to taste them)

I would strongly recommend joining one of the guided tours that run throughout the day and are included in the entrance fee.

At the end of the tour, visitors are shown a video documentary and...surprise!...at the end of it, a member of the Hawley family (the one that found the wreck and manages the museum) shows up and addresses the group, ready to answer any additional questions about the Arabia.

After 30 years of work, the restoration of the Arabia Steamboat’s contents is not yet finished, there are still tons of material in storage waiting to be cleaned. Visitors to the museum can get an idea also about how the items are cleaned and prepared for exhibition at a special lab (picture below).

And this is not all, the Hawley family is already preparing to dig a second wreck, this one of 1841, while it keeps looking for more. Ultimately their idea is to add sections to the museum, with one wreck from each decade of the first half of the 19th Century.

Note: the Steamboat Arabia museum may be moving to a new location in the coming years, something that has not been decided yet. This is a real possibility as new space will need to be found if salvage of additional wrecks goes ahead.

TWA Museum

This is a really small museum, but one that will surely delight aviation history enthusiasts.

Although no longer in existence, the TWA brand has retained much of its allure and it remains, to this day, one of the most iconic airlines in commercial aviation history.

The museum, that is located in a building adjacent to Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport (just across the river from downtown Kansas City) is absolutely packed with all sorts of memorabilia connected to the history of the airline.

You can also admire a beautifully preserved Lockheed Electra aircraft, which, I later learned, had arrived to the museum the day prior to my visit!

Also, right by Kansas City Downtown Airport, is the National Airline History Museum. Unfortunately, it was closed on the day I was in town, but from what you can find on its website it looks like an interesting option to combine with the TWA museum.

Other interesting museums in Kansas City

Here are some other museums, that, had I had the time, would have been next in my schedule. I leave the details here, in part as a to-do note for my next visit!

Nelson-Atkins Art Museum

Apparently one of the best art museums in the Midwest (and in America, for that matter!)

https://nelson-atkins.org/visitor-information/

Money Museum

Located within the building of the Federal Reserve of Kansas City and just across the street from the National WW1 Museum and Memorial grounds. To judge from the reviews, this seems to be also quite an interesting museum.

https://www.kansascityfed.org/moneymuseum

Shopping

While on the museum front Kansas City really overshoot my expectations, the shopping experience was a bit underwhelming, at least when it comes to the city centre (didn’t explore big box retailers and malls in the suburbia).

To be fair, I visited just one downtown mall, Crown Center, located next to the WW1 museum and Union Station. It is part of a large office complex of the same name (that happens to be the HQ of famous Hallmark greeting card company!), but I found the offerings, both shopping and eating, to be nothing to write home about. It also closed at 7pm, which is quite early (even for European standards!).

Same story for nearby Union Station. As I got there on my (unfulfilled) quest to find some spot to eat before the taps ceremony at the museum. The station itself is quite beautiful and monumental, a vestige of the time when Kansas City was a major rail hub, however it was totally deserted and only one, not too appealing, restaurant was open.

To be fair, preparations were going on for some sort of festival, which may explain why activity was below normal, but even taking this into account it was far from what I was expecting from such as central spot.

Miquel 3/16/19 Miquel 3/16/19

Behind the scenes at the Cirque du Soleil

One of Québec’s most popular exports, alongside aircraft and “poutine”, is the magic of the Cirque du Soleil…

It was a wintry morning when we visited the Cirque du Soleil’s HQ. Here the view from the conference room, with downtown Montréal and the hill that gives its name to the city (to the right)

One of Québec’s most popular exports, alongside Bombardier aircraft and the famous, highly-caloric dish “poutine”, is the magic of the Cirque du Soleil.

What started as a mere band of street jugglers has become, in a matter of decades, a global entertainment business with several simultaneous shows running all over the World.

The Cirque du Soleil, however, remains firmly rooted in the city of Montréal, where it has its HQ.

After having been able to enjoy, a few months ago, “Sonor”, one of the Cirque’s latest shows, onboard the cruise ship MSC Meraviglia, I accepted an invitation by MSC Cruises to come to Montréal and see the backstage where these shows are conceived and readied for launch.

During this trip, I not only had the chance to learn about this very unique company that is the Cirque du Soleil, and get acquainted with the modus operandi that lies at the base of its success, but also, and despite the cold December weather, to explore on foot some of the most interesting bits of Québec’s largest city.

A city of creativity

The Cirque du Soleil HQ is located in one of Montreal’s northern suburbs.

It is a rather special place, that combines the cold, modern functionality of a corporate headquarters with the vibe of a creative environment, the healthy discipline of a high performance sports training center and the buzz of an artisan workshop.

Because the Cirque du Soleil is all of these things at the same time.

One of the open areas at Cirque du Soleil HQ

To give you an idea of the orders of magnitude we are talking about, some 4,000 people work for the Cirque du Soleil globally, and of these around 1,500 are based in Montréal.

But, how does the Cirque find the rather exceptional artistic talent that is needed to staff all those shows?

Well, it sources it from, literally, everywhere.

It has what is, arguably, the largest professional database in this segment, with over 55,000 artists. So, the Cirque’s recruiters are quite sure to find whatever skill they need, whether it’s former gymnasts or whole families of acrobats (something not unusual in some parts of the World).

Whenever there is a new show in the making, the selected performers gather in Montréal and practice together for a few months at the Cirque’s facilities. We had a chance to observe some of them in action, training and it was hard to keep the attention at any one place, since there was so much going on at the same time at the large, factory-sized training facility.

cirque du soleil performers training.JPG

The Cirque du Soleil at Sea

If its performances are usually an artistic tour-de-force, the Cirque du Soleil has taken things one step further by developing a new generation of shows specifically designed to fit in the constrained spaces of cruise ships.

The partnership with cruise operator MSC Cruises has produced already four of such shows, “Sonor” and “Viaggio” on MSC Meraviglia and “Varélia” and Syma” on the recently launched (it had its maiden voyage on 4th March) MSC Bellissima. Four additional shows are being prepared for the upcoming new ships MSC Grandiosa and MSC Virtuosa, that will be launched in late 2019 and 2020 respectively.

Syma is the story of a young sailor that is stranded on an island full of fantastic and mysterious creatures.
Varélia is about a princess with violet skin and its admirer-hero, who happens to be blind. Then there is a villain, that kidnaps the princess because he has an obsession for all things violet. The hero will embark on a quest to liberate her, with the help of some other friendly characters…

At the time of this visit, the Cirque and MSC were readying the launch of these two shows.

Thus, we were shown a preview under conditions of strict confidentiality and learned about the challenges of performing on a moving ship.

The creative team explains the concept behind the show “Varélia”, that launched on MSC Bellissima in March 2019

The shows themselves are of a smaller, shorter format than the ones on land.

There are several factor that need to be taken into account, one is the fact that the ship is not static. In the evening, when the performances take place, the ship is usually moving and, although we are talking about some of the largest ships in the World, some swell is inevitable.

Another factor has to do with space, as it is obviously at a premium onboard a ship. For this venture, MSC built dedicated theatres at the stern of the ships. These have a special, custom-made design at a cost of over $20M each.

Last but not least, the logistics are also constrained. If a show on land can typically employ some 50 performes and another 170 as support crew, the sea-going troupes are usually 15-16, with a similar number as support staff.

While they are at sea, the artists have to rely on themselves, this includes make up. Here they train them, so that they are able to apply their own make up before the shows as well.

Another highlight of the tour was a pre-view of different scenes of the two new shows designed for MSC Bellissima. These are now, more or less in the open, but not at the time of the visit. One of the things that truly amazed me is the effortless look of those practicing these amazing stunts. I am sure there is a lot of work behind them, but, the appearance of ease and naturality is simply awesome.

The Workshop

The show’s are expected to be visually stunning, this is one of the hallmarks of the Cirque.

One of the essential functions of the Montréal HQ is to act as a supply center for all the Cirque’s branches around the World, whether in Las Vegas, China or a cruise ship somewhere in the Mediterranean.

in addition to its administrative and training functions, a third and rather large section of the Cirque’s facilities is occupied by a super-sized workshop. Here all sort of costumes and atrezzo are designed and manufactured to match the demands of each of the shows.

Everything is done in-house and even the clothes and shoes are made to measure.

Technology plays a role in Cirque’s du Soleil shows, of course, but it is very subtle, a support rather than the main theme. The artists remain the protagonists at all times.

And this is also true behind the scenes. A large amount of processes and work is done by hand. It’s artisan work. But different technologies are also leveraged, for example a broad range of innovative materials are used for lightness and comfort, even if sometimes are made to look like another sort of material. It is a constant process of experimentation, that gets feedback from the performers all the time.

Also, 3D printing (below), for example, is finding its uses in this environment that requires a high degree of customization.

The result of all this…you will need to book a cruise on either MSC Meraviglia or Bellissima to find out!

BONUS: A walk through Montréal

It was a short trip, but there was also some time to visit Montréal’s downtown and its historial center, one of the oldest and in North America, and allegedly one of the most charming too…although it was rather cold and deserted at the time of my walk!

Place Jacques Cartier, with the Nelson column at the end of it

Montréal is built on an island on the St. Lawrence river and the old town, the Vieux-Port area, occupies its Eastern shore. The stone houses and 18 and 19th C. architecture gives to this district a rather harmonious, “old-world” vibe, although the historical area, properly speaking is quite small, at least for European standards.

One of the details I found interesting is that of these two statues below, located on the Places des Armes, the historical heart of the old city. They, apparently represent the British (him) and French (her) powers, the tension between the two cultural and political spheres that have shaped the history of Montréal and the rest of Québec.

Moving away from the Vieux Port and into the modern downtown, I found this other statue, perhaps with less political undertones, but undoubtedly very representative of the times we live in.

A view of downtown Montréal from the snowed-in campus of McGill University

Where to stay in Montréal

The Fairmont Queen Elizabeth

900 René-Lévesque Blvd W

Montreal, QC H3B 4A5

The embodiment of a landmark hotel.

A big, granitic, building in the very center of the city. It is even possible to access the metro directly from its premises.

Nice views from the upper floors. Rooms with a contemporary, warm design and large bathroom.

One of the pluses of this hotel is the executive lounge on the top floor.

Here there is a cozy atmosphere and it is possible to enjoy either breakfast or a selection of tasty snacks, sushi, cold cuts and drinks during the day.