During my visit, the spectacular new Sprint Center hosted a Michael Buble concert one night and bull riding competition the next. On the weekend, the Sprint Center hosted the Big 12 Conference basketball tournament.
Attached and next door to the Sprint Center is the College Basketball Experience. It combines the College Basketball Hall of Fame and a hands-on experience that every basketball fanatic will love. It’s $10 for adults and $6 for children and you can play basketball all day. You can beat the buzzer, you can shoot threes, shoot free throws with fans waving and cheering in the background, play pickup games or hone your defensive and passing skills. I shot baskets non-stop for more than a half hour. My back and knees are still paying the price.
Across the street is the new Power & Light District. More than 80 restaurants and shops completed the project in 2009. It’s the happening night scene in Kansas City.
KC also has more than 200 fountains. Only Rome has more. The Negro League Museum and the American Jazz Museum are musts. The two museums share the same lobby. The old baseball Negro leagues ran from 1920 until 1960. The history of jazz is a tribute to the great black musicians who played the clubs at 18th and Vine during the 1920s, ’30s and ’40s. The museums are a study in segregation and how black ballplayers and musicians helped start the movement toward desegregation.
The “new” Kansas City offers impressive museums — including the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art — great restaurants, four- and five-star hotels and trendy shopping.
If that isn’t enough, go to the Hallmark Visitors Center to see how one of the world’s most famous brands got its start. In the fall and winter, take in a Kansas City Chiefs football game. In the spring and summer, it’s Kansas City Royals baseball. Peruse the trendy KC stores along Country Club Plaza and the Crown Center or visit the new hotspots at Zona Rosa and The Legends at Village West.
Learn more about Kansas City at www.visitkc.com.
