Smart Travels: Michigan: Lower Peninsula

Monday 5 August 2019

Michigan: Lower Peninsula

Detroit in the early morning

After arriving from Toronto and before heading to Michigan's Upper Peninsula we explored some of what Michigan's Lower Peninsula had to offer, based out of my brother's place in Plymouth. Our first trip was to the university (or college as they say in the States) town of Ann Arbor.

Ann Arbor

The Detroit area is famous for its car industry, and the next day we headed to the massive Henry Ford Museum. The museum has several sections: an outdoor living history museum called Greenfield Village, a proper museum per se called the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation, and a third part that we didn't visit: the car factory. Together it is the largest indoor-outdoor museum complex in the United States and is visited by over 1.7 million people each year.

American dictionary writer Noah Webster's Connecticut house
was transported, restored and rebuilt in Greenfield Village

1927 Ford Model T

1961 Lincoln in which Kennedy was shot in 1963
(continued to be used by other presidents until 1977)

On 1/12/55 in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat in
this bus to a white man, sparking the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement

Chair in which Abraham Lincoln was assassinated
in Washington on 14 April 1865

On the following day we headed into downtown Detroit proper.

Windsor Ontario seen from Detroit's Riverfront Park.
Ambassador bridge connecting the two countries is to the right.
This is one of the few places where Canada is the south of the USA

Downtown Detroit seen from Belle Isle. GM's world headquarters are
in the Renaissance Center (tallest buildings to the left of the photo)

When we visited the riverside Renaissance Center, we saw a 2019 Chevrolet Silverado Trail Boss made entirely from 334,544 lego bricks.

It took 18 "lego masters" 2000 hours to build this Chevrolet

Hart Plaza in Detroit, with Windsor (Canada) in the background

Fisher building (1927)

The next day we started heading up to the Upper Peninsula (UP) and stopped in Frankenmuth which is famous for Bronner's Christmas Wonderland, a retail store that promotes itself as the "World's Largest Christmas Store". It's open year-round so we were able to visit, even though it was July!

inside Bronner's Christmas Wonderland

The day after our return to Plymouth following our trip to the UP, Wisconsin, and Chicago we went on a 30-mile bike ride to Fair Lane, the home of Henry and Clara Ford from 1915 until their respective deaths in 1947 and 1950. The 56-room mansion was undergoing renovations at the time of our visit, but we still able to visit the grounds.

Fair Lane main residence

statue of Clara and Henry Ford

back of the main residence

The following day was also Ford-family related as we were taken to visit Edsel & Eleanor Ford's house. (Edsel was Henry Ford's only child and actually predeceased his father by four years). The Cotswold-style house was built in 1920s and faces Lake St Clair, one of the less well-known Great Lakes.

Edsel & Eleanor Ford house

a playhouse, built to scale for Josephine (the only daughter of the couple's 4
children) when she was 7. As she was a tomboy she didn't use it very much!

Monarch butterfly

In the afternoon we visited Cranbrook, a 315-acre art and educational complex in Bloomfield Hills, built in the 1920s by Detroit newspaper magnate Georges Booth. It comprises an Academy of Art, a contemporary Art Museum, house & gardens, Natural History Museum and preparatory schools.

The main house, built in the 1920s, is Tudor style

part of Cranbrook gardens

Japanese Garden

in the grounds of Cranbrook Art Museum

We then set off for a second, shorter road trip just to the north-west and west of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Our first stop was at Lake Superior where we had a quick dip in the chilly water (probably 10-15°C).

turkey vultures eating a dead fish on the shore of Lake Superior

path to the shore of Lake Superior; note the "no snowmobiles" sign

dragonfly near Lake Superior

Our next stop was at Sleeping Bear Dunes, the largest freshwater dunes in the world. The Native American legend says that they are a sleeping mother bear who swam across Lake Michigan with her two cubs. The cubs drowned but resurfaced as two nearby islands so the heartbroken mother still lies there, looking after her children.

running down one of the dunes

Sleeping Bear Dunes seen from further south

We stayed in nearby Traverse City, and our trip coincided with the town's annual Film Festival. It was co-founded by Michigan native Michael Moore in 2005.

State Theatre, Traverse City

North of Traverse City and Sleeping Bear Dunes is Mission Point Peninsula, at the top of which you can stand on the 45th Parallel, i.e. halfway between the North Pole and the Equator.

Mission Point lighthosue

Mission Point lighthouse and 45th parallel sign

The area is also (locally) famous for lavender, cherry-growing and wine, so of course we had to do some wine-tasting!

Brys Estate Vineyard & Winery

wine-tasting at Shady Lane Cellars

lavender fields at Brys Estates

panoramic view of Lake Michigan from Arcadia Scenic Turnout

Our next overnight stop was inland at Grand Rapids, Michigan's second-largest city, which owes its name to the rapids of the Grand River.

part of Grand Rapids seen from the river

in Grand Rapids

Alexander Calder sculpture in Grand Rapids called "La Grande Vitesse"

Our hotel was opposite the Grand Rapids Public Museum, and an Apollo capsule used for training astronauts sits outside. It was sealed as a time capsule on the last day of America's bicentennial year (1976) and is due to be opened on July 4th, 2076, as part of tricentennial celebrations.

Apollo (time) capsule outside Grand Rapids Public Museum

We then headed back towards the lakeside, occasionally stopping in small towns that used to be thriving a century ago but became virtual ghost towns once the supply of timber that made their fortune had disappeared.

Bustling downtown Manistee, so busy that you can
stand in the middle of the main street to take a photo

We also stopped in colourful Saugatuck and the adjacent town of Douglas. Saugatuck developed into a noted art colony and has now become a tourist destination, especially popular with gay and lesbian tourists from Midwestern urban areas.

in Saugatuck

Saugatuck Village Hall

Outside the village hall is the following sign about the 'ghost town' of Singapore:

sign about Singapore, Michigan

"Beneath the sands near the mouth of the Kalamazoo River lies the site of Singapore, one of Michigan's most famous ghost towns. Founded in 1830s by New York land speculators, who hoped it would rival Chicago or Milwaukee as a lake port, Singapore was in fact, until 1870s, a busy lumbering town. With three mills, two hotels, several general stores, and a renowned "Wild-cat" bank, it outshone its neighbor to the south, "The Flats," as Saugatauk was then called. When the supply of timber was exhausted the mills closed, the once bustling waterfront grew quiet. The people left, most of them settling here in Saugatauk. Gradually, Lake Michigan's shifting sand buried Singapore."

chain ferry, Saugatuck

On our final day in Michigan before heading back to Reunion via Toronto, we explored some of the area south of Detroit, venturing as far south as Toledo in Ohio. We also stopped by the shore of Lake Erie, the only Great Lake we hadn't visited.

downtown Toldeo skyline

looking across Lake Erie to Canada

One of our final stops was at Cabela's, a chain of massive hunting, fishing, camping, shooting and outdoor gear shops. This one in Dundee is 21,000m3 and has its own walk-through aquarium, gun library, restaurant and fudge shop.