Things to Do in East Chicago

During the Gary SouthShore RailCats' inaugural season in 2002, the players spent an estimated 200 hours on buses—traveling approximately 12,000 miles without their own ballpark to call home. Indeed, the diamond at U.S. Steel Yard was still under construction, forcing the team to play its entire first season on the road. But while the trip could have been a rocky way for an organization to start out, it instead forecasted a wild ride ahead in which the RailCats never stopped moving. After just four years, the RailCats captured their first Northern League title, marking the first of five straight appearances in the championship series—a Northern League record.

Despite that first year away from home, the RailCats seem to have settled in well at U.S. Steel Yard. Within the park, views of the South Shore commuter train remind fans of the team's origins, and a 55-foot scoreboard towers over left-centerfield in much the same way early pitchers once towered over batters from atop a stack of milk crates.

In 1910, when apothecaries regularly doled out narcotics and opiates for issues such as headaches or nausea, Joseph Meyer was planting natural alternatives to the questionable contents of the brown bottles. Through research, careful tending of herbs and medicinal plants, and labor negotiations with garden-gnome unions, Meyer's small operation grew steadily. He acquired a tract of land on the Little Calumet River where he grew medicinal plants and cultivated flora. Eventually, the tract of land was finished with an English gabled building and given a name: Indiana Botanic Gardens, Inc.

More than a century after Meyer actualized his vision of providing natural health alternatives, his family continues to champion his idea. They curate an ever-expanding inventory that includes vitamins, nutritional supplements, and bulk herbals—all of which may be purchased both in-store and online.

The team sits silently, trigger fingers poised to unleash the simulated ammo in their laser-tag guns. Nearby, one of their teammates waits to be rescued. The team's leader creeps forward, checks the area, and gestures to the others. They locate their captured comrade, but something is amiss: the pilot's head is shaking. The air fills with flashes of light, and the battle is over.

Team Combat Live uses laser tag as a means to act out immersive tactical scenarios, foster team camaraderie, and covertly scan supermarket barcodes. In indoor and outdoor spaces, combatants run, crouch, and fire, using the same laser gear employed by SWAT teams and Special Forces. To further hone tactical skills, Team Combat Live sprinkles each battlefield with ammo boxes and medic locations. Their instructors, including a certified SWAT instructor, also host summer camps that teach tactical maneuvers.

Open until at least midnight nightly, Dyer’s night-owl-friendly Stardust Bowl III hosts bowling face-offs in a sprawling complex with 48 lanes. Merrillville’s even larger Stardust Bowl II lets patrons scatter pins on one of 68 lanes or shoot for table pockets in the billiards room. Arcades at both alleys bolster joystick-specific agility, and after working up an appetite hefting heavy balls, bowlers can quell their hunger at Merrillville’s coffee shop or Dyer’s full-service restaurant. Birthday parties and groups garner special discounts at both alleys, and at Dyer’s partygoers can keep secret handshakes truly secret by retiring to one of five private party rooms.

Stardust Bowl's two locations welcome everyone from casual groups to diehard competitors, keeping lanes open as late as 11 p.m. in Merrillville and as late as 1 a.m. in Dyer. In between frames, patrons can refuel with a quick bite or drink from the snack bar, try their hand at the Merrillville location's billiard tables, or visit the Dyer alley's arcade. The Dyer location ramps up the energy on select evenings with starlight bowling, showering all 48 lanes with laser lights and cranking up the sound system's playlist of spirited mayoral debates.