Reunion Tower is the place I decided to visit to get a bird’s eye view of Dallas Texas. The tower is 171m (561ft) high and was originally a free-standing structure, it is now a part of the Hyatt Hotel.

A nice view!

Reunion Tower

The tower was built in 1978 and has three floors at the top:

• The GeO-Deck, the observation deck, is on the lowest level and you have to pay to visit. There is also a café on this level called Cloud 9, but it is only open on weekends. Found this a bit strange as it would be a nice place for a drink or a coffee anytime. This is the level I visited
• The middle floor is also Wolfgang Puck’s, it is used as a special events area
• Wolfgang Puck’s Five Sixty Restaurant takes up the top floor. It is a revolving fine dining restaurant, I guess that the prices will be sky-high due to the height of the restaurant, maybe something to do with the Chef as well

From the tower you can see:

• Dealey Plaza
• The Cotton Bowl
• The Omni Hotel
• The restored Mobil Flying Horse from the Magnolia Oil Building
• Dallas City Town Hall
• South Side on Lamar
• Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge
• Margaret McDermott Bridge
• And a lot more!

Oz’s Useless Trivia

Some useless trivia for you:

• The tower is known locally as The Ball
• At night the tower is lit up by 259 custom LED fixtures
• The Ball is a geodesic dome
• The dome is made up of aluminium struts and there are 260 intersections each of which is  covered by an aluminum circle with the LED lights in the center. 260 – 259 = 1? One of the intersections doesn’t light up, I wonder which one??

• Reunion Tower can be seen in the original RoboCop movie, which is interesting as RoboCop was set in Detroit. One of my favourite movies. “I’d buy that for a dollar”
• The tower also features in the opening credits of Dallas
• It was destroyed by an Asteroid in 1997 (well in a 1997 TV Movie called Asteroid)
• The Amazing Race Season 26 also included the Tower in its season Finale

I enjoyed my time visiting the tower, although dinner at Wolfgang Puck’s Five Sixty might have been a better option!

Next up we return to normal transmission (well for a short while) dinner at Cafe Pacific.