
Droning America: South Bend, IN
AIRVŪZ STAFF NOTE :
On this episode of Droning America host Angie Avestruz and the team travel to one of the ultimate USA college towns: South Bend, Indiana, aka the home of Notre Dame University. Angie tours the town with former UND football team quarterback, Evan Sharpley. Highlights include a stroll around the UND quad where they check out the Main Building (aka the Golden Dome!), the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes and the Touchdown Jesus at the UND stadium. Founded in 1842, UND is considered one of the USA's top universities.
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On this episode of Droning America host Angie Avestruz and the team travel to South Bend, Indiana where former Notre Dame quarterback, Evan Sharpley, shows them around! Things kick off with a stroll around the University of Notre Dame’s quad where they check out the Main Building (aka the Golden Dome!), the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes and of course, the football stadium with a view of Touchdown Jesus! Next they travel downtown to check out the popular Seitz Park and St. Joseph’s River. There they get a view of America’s first man-made white water rafting course, the East Race Waterway! Evan tells Angie she has to come back at night to check out the South Bend River Lights and he was absolutely right! You won’t want to miss this impressive light show that turns the river into a work of art! Finally, Angie gets talked into taking a trip to Sharpley Training for a real South Bend workout… and it’s all captured on a drone! Check out all the city views we’ve captured around the country on Droning America by visiting AirVūz.com. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: Angie: Hello and welcome to Droning America. I'm your host, Angie Avestruz. Today, we're in a Midwestern city. It's a college town and it's the capital of college football. Welcome to South Bend, Indiana. Our first destination is just down the street and adjacent to South [00:00:30] Bend. It's the home of the Fighting Irish and is where our special guest is waiting to meet up with us. We are so lucky to have Evan Sharpley, former Notre Dame quarterback as our tour guide here in South Bend. Thanks for joining us. Evan: I'm pumped. Thanks for having me. It's a lot of fun. Angie: Right now we are on the beautiful Notre Dame campus, but where exactly are we walking on campus? Evan: Right now, we're right next to the main building, which is the Golden Dome, [00:01:00] kind of known nationally. That's where all the provosts and all the important people are. We've got beautiful weather today, so it's been awesome walking around campus. Angie: I've heard that is actual 23 carat gold on top of that dome. What do you know about that? Evan: It is. I know they recently redid it over the last year, so there's a big restoration process going up there with some real gold. Rumor has it there were a few students that tried to get up there and shave some of the gold off. It didn't go over too well. Angie: What are some other notable spots here in [inaudible 00:01:27]? Is that the Basilica right over there? Evan: The Visilia's [00:01:30] right over here. The Basilica of the Sacred Heart, one of my favorite places. On Saturday game days for football, we would have mass there before the game, so it was a really special moment going through mass and then walking to the stadium. Right behind the Basilica is probably my favorite place on campus, which is the Grotto. It's a replica of actually a Grotto in France. People go there, light candles, usually before big tests. Angie: Now, it is said by many that seeing a Notre Dame football game is a spiritual [00:02:00] experience. Can you talk a little bit about the culture that surrounds football here in that beautiful stadium? Evan: Yes, I would have to say that for sure. For people that haven't been here, it certainly is a bucket list type of thing. Some people get it, some people don't. You hear that a lot of times about a place like Notre Dame. It is very special, but just the tradition here, the feel on campus is pretty special. It's hard to explain unless you've actually been here and experienced it. Angie: Another unique feature of the stadium is Touchdown Jesus, which is this huge mural you can see [00:02:30] from inside the stadium? Evan: Yes. Behind one of the end zones, with the original construction of the stadium, you can see the whole building. It's the library. There's this big picture of Jesus looking like he's putting his hands up signaling a touchdown, and then over the years, they've done some construction on the stadium. You can still kind of see it. It's not as plain, but it's one of the probably the most famous places that if you come here for your first time, you see a bunch of people going over to the clod standing in front of Touchdown Jesus putting their arms [00:03:00] up in the air. Angie: Absolutely. So much history on this campus. It really is something to see. From a historic university rich with traditions to a booming river area in the heart of South Bend. Next stop for us is Seitz Park. Evan, we made the short trek to downtown South Band. Where are we hanging out now? Evan: We're down at the East Race right now. It's a manmade little waterway, first of its kind in the US, North America in the 1980s. We had a couple of buddies that go over here and white water rafting quite often, so it's very peaceful, if you haven't noticed. It's very peaceful [00:03:30] down here. Of course, in a couple weeks when Notre Dame play football games, downtown's going to be a little bit different. Angie: You can see a downtown South Bend skyline we'll call it behind us. What else is there to see and do? What are some of these buildings back here? Evan: Yes, I guess if you want to call it a skyline. Well, one of my favorite places, special and near and dear to my heart is the Morris Performing Arts Center. A lot of Broadway plays go through there, Wicked, Rock of Ages. It's a popular place downtown. One other area that's kind of revitalized really downtown over the past year or so is [00:04:00] Four Winds Field. They were owned by the Arizona Diamondbacks and now the Chicago Cubs own them, so as you can imagine, we get a lot of people here from Chicago, a lot of Cubs fans in this area. On a nightly basis, it's a really cool place, family friendly. A lot of families go there and watch the baby Cubs play, so they've done a great job of taking over the downtown. I know they've got some great plans over the next couple of years to really revitalize the downtown area. Angie: Yes. Looking around just this area, you kind of notice these art installations and lights. What's [00:04:30] the deal with all those? Evan: Yes. There's several installations and lights, and as soon as the sun goes down, those lights go on. You definitely have to stop by and see it if you haven't before. As you can see, it's just kind of a relaxing area. Angie: Well, that's awesome. I'm definitely going to have to come back tonight to check it out. Evan, thank you so much for showing me around South Bend. I've enjoyed it. Evan: Yes, for sure. It's been great. Before we let you go, we've got to stop by my gym. We're going to have to put you through a little Sharpley Training workout. Everyone that rolls through South Bend has to do that, so we'll put you through the paces. Angie: Under one condition. Can we drone it? Evan: [00:05:00] Absolutely. Let's get it done. Angie: All right, I'll see you out there. I'm not one to turn down a challenge, so off to Sharpley Training in Elkhart we go. Let's do this. Sharpley Training is no joke. That [00:05:30] workout kicked my butt, but now it's time to freshen up and head back out to South Bend to check out the night scene. Evan was right. You should definitely come check out the South Bend River Lights here on St. Joseph's River at night. It is beautiful seeing all the different color lights reflecting off the water. This was all put here to celebrate South Bend's 150th birthday and to highlight the city's greatest natural resource. Thanks for hanging out with us. Hope you've enjoyed it as much as we have. If you think we should stop in your city next, [00:06:00] tweet us @DroningAmerica to let us know why. Bye.
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