Fine, I’ll finally concede, I’m not the best at blogging. I have lofty goals of recording every trip I take, mostly for my mom (hi mom, I miss you!) and I know I have a scattering of friends who like to read it and check out the pictures. But I also love doing it for me, so I feel disappointed that I don’t keep up with it as much as I’d like to, but with working a full-time job teaching, where some evenings I come home and work until 9, it’s hard to keep up. But this recent trip to Detroit, Michigan had me so excited I knew I had to make time for it. I’ve been to Detroit before, and every time I visit, I love it a little bit more. And despite not planning before we left, every thing on this trip just came together so well. So here it is, and take my advice, get to Detroit!
Detroit from Columbus is only a 3 hour drive, so after work on Friday my friend Tommy and I headed north. Tommy and I have done other road trips together, including to Washington DC with his beautiful daughter, and to Cincy to watch a Bengals game. Our trip started off great, unlike this car that we passed on the road: that’s a gas pump trailing the car, has this ever happened to you? Or have you seen any other peculiarities during a road trip?
While we were driving to Michigan, we were listening to music and I was reading some suggestions that my friend Lindsey had sent me, and we came across an interesting coincidence: one of the things Lindsey had one her wish-list was a place called “Marvin’s Marvelous Mechanical Museum” and loving the name I had to read it to Tommy, at which point he told me that happened to be the name of an album by a band he really loved- Tally Ha. So we googled it and when I saw pictures (of the museum, not the album- which we did end up listening to) I knew we had to stop! So we made our first spur-of-the-moment decision, to make a short detour to the town of Farmington Hills, MI to check out this wonder. When we pulled in a strip mall I thought we had made a wrong turn, but then we saw this sign and I knew we were in the right spot. And that sign had nothing on the wonder we were greeted with as soon as we entered.
Marvin’s museum lives up to its name- it is marvelous and there are all kinds of mechanical wonder. In a space of 5000 square feet there are vintage coin-operated machines, but also nostalgia and oddities from different decades and collected over the years by Marvin. Every inch is decorated by posters, model airplanes, collectors items, neon signs and more. All you need are some quarters and you can spend hours playing games, or just wandering around taking it all in. We choose to use most of our quarters playing some of the old machines, such as the gem pictured below that told you your health, or the next guy promising to give players a shock. We put money in one machine with a cigar-smoking baby just to listen to him throw insults at us.
We also played some games that you would see at the likes of Dave & Buster, like skee-ball and other games where you can win tickets, and Tommy showed off his pin-ball skills (and they were legit!) There was so much to see and for just $10 worth of quarters we had a few hours of fun.
We even got to turn in our tickets for these awesome prizes!
After leaving Marvin’s Marvelous Mechanical Museum (say it aloud- it’s just so fun to say!) we headed to our AirBnb for the night. The next day we woke up and decided to get breakfast someplace close by, so we headed to Rose’s Fine Food. Though it’s not much to look at from the outside, the food was outstanding, and from our spot at the counter we got to watch all the food being made, therefore question our food decisions because it all looked sooo good, I would definitely go back.
After filling our bellies we headed a few miles away to check out the Heidelberg Project. This is an outdoor art project started in 1986 by Tyree Guyton, who returned to his neighborhood and found it in shambles, so he and his grandpa and some neighborhood children started collecting refuse, transforming the neighborhood. They even turned some abandoned houses into “gigantic art sculptures”. It really is a sight to see, so after making a few passes in the car we braved the cold to get out and explore more up close.
One major theme you will notice is all the clocks, meant for visitors to reflect on where they have been, where they are now, and where they are going.
Our next destination was just a quick drive away, the island of Belle Isle, created in 1880 to be an outdoor oasis for the residents of Detroit. This island, located in international waters of the Detroit river, separates Detroit and Windsor, Canada, both of which you can see from the shores of the island. While it was very cold out and there weren’t many people there, we did check out the conservatory and the aquarium.
The Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory is the oldest continually-running conservatory in the US, and is divided into 5 sections: the Palm House (where a giant palm tree looks like it is soon going to bust out of the ceiling), the Tropical House, the Cactus House, and Fern House and a Show House.
Located next door is the Belle Isle Aquarium, opened in 1904 and is the oldest aquarium in the US. We enjoyed checking out the fish, especially the seahorses, puffer fish and a very active turtle.
When we were leaving the conservatory we struck up a conversation with the women working there, who were first excited that people from Columbus were visiting Detroit (“I love your city!” I told them) and then gave us some new ideas about places to visit. “You’ve got to head over to Eastern Market, especially since it’s Saturday morning” they said, so that’s exactly where we headed next.
The Eastern Market is the largest historic public market district in the US, and it is indeed a district, with the warehouses (there were 5 to walk through) stretching a mile long, and there are lots of shops and restaurants lining the streets on either side of the Market. There are over 150 vendors, and being as it was almost Christmas, the Christmas tree and wreath sellers were out in abundance! There were also lots of fruit and veggie sellers, handing out free samples. Tommy got some hot cider to sip on while we were wandering around (half of the warehouses are open to the outside, and some are inside) and we were loving strolling around taking in the sights, along with what seemed half the city. But I didn’t blame them, if I lived here I would be here every weekend, the prices were great and the wares looked and tasted delicious! There were some musicians out entertaining shoppers with their music also.
The Eastern Market opened in 1891, with sheds being added in 1922 and 1929. In 1970, the stalls rented by farmers were decorated with paintings of produce and livestock, and now those murals are all around the area, and I just loved them!
All that walking and “window-shopping” made me thirsty, so we headed to one of the several breweries in the area, the Eastern Market Brewing Company. We both got flights, the strawberry milkshake and elephant juice beers were my favorite!
Also in the area was the Detroit City Distillery, so we stopped in for some yummy cocktails. These were sooooo good!
Our next stop was an area our AirBnb hosts had told us about, an area called ‘The Belt’. This is just an alley in the heart of downtown Detroit, named because of its location in the former garment district. The parking garage and the alley are covered with murals and artwork.
I read a lot about the bars and restaurants that are popular. Our host was very enthusiastic about one called The Skip. Our thoughts: it was just okay, but I did enjoy their Christmas decor, I’m told it gets very decorative during the Christmas season, so this is probably just a sneak peek.
Our final stop on Saturday was to see the old abandoned train station, Michigan Central Station (recently purchased by Ford my Airbnb host told me). This train station was used from 1914-1988, and was the tallest train station in the world when it was built. It was dark when we saw it, but it is very eerily beautiful. Here is a pic I took of it on a previous trip:
We were hungry, but when I looked at my map I found we were right across the street from a restaurant I wanted to check out: Gold Cash Gold (I forgot to snap a pic of the outside so I had to find one on the Internet). We just got appetizers, but what we had tasted amazing, I would definitely come back. This was where we ended the night, heading back to our AirBnb to catch some z’s.
The next morning we checked out a breakfast spot Tommy read about it called Le Petit Déjeuner. It was family style breakfast, everyone sharing the ordered food, but we had to wait over an hour and a half for our food to come! And then we never got water or coffee refills (we had to wait over 30 minutes for our coffee, and that was only when we went to the hostess to beg for some). To make up for our lack of coffee they gave us coffees to go- only they didn’t have cups! The highlight of the morning was getting these soup bowls of coffee.
There are lots of breweries in Detroit I wanted to check out (I love going to breweries, I completed the Cbus ale trail last year, and I’m almost finished with it this year), and Jolly Pumpkin was definitely on my list- I love sours! We got flights and they were awesome- especially the Keiki No More. They have a full kitchen too with lots of yummy looking food, we probably should’ve eaten there, but then we wouldn’t have experienced our soup coffee, so I guess it worked out for the best.
And then we headed to our final destination- Dearborn, MI and the Ford Museum. We were undecided about whether to go into the museum, showcasing cars, trains and all sorts of transportation memorabilia, or Greenfield Village, a historic town. But we decided we were in the mood to see some old houses with people working in-character, especially since it was starting to be decorated for Christmas! I had visited both as a child with my grandparents, and the museum after college with my parents, so I was excited to see either again because I have such great memories, but I love getting my history geek on by taking steps back in time.
Greenfield Village was opened in 1933 as the first outdoor museum of its type. There are almost a hundred historical buildings that were bought by Ford, moved from their original locations and arranged into a village setting. I was told by a worker that Ford was inspired by real Americans who were innovative and made something for themselves out of nothing, such as the Wright Brothers, or Heinz. Ford wanted to show how Americans lived and worked since the founding of the country. The people working interpret what life was like in the shops and buildings. I had a blast walking through and exploring, if you come to Detroit you have to check this out!
Our first stop was the Ford childhood home and workshop, where he built his ‘quadricycle’.
Visitors can explore a millinery’s and general store and see goods that were actually sold back in the 1880s.
Here are the Wright Brother’s and Heinz shops.
One of my favorite places was the Wright Brothers childhood home, brought from Dayton, Ohio. The inside of the homes are decorated exactly the same as they were before they were brought, down to matching rugs and wallpaper.
There’s a massive area called Porches and Parlors with dozens of furnished houses that you can wander in and out of, like this- the Sarah Jordan Boarding House, where workers at the Edison factory stayed, and where experimental lighting was installed in 1879 (check out the wires running across he ceiling). I loved the village, I could’ve spent hours there but it closed at 5 so we had to leave. Give yourself more than the 3 hours we did!
That was our weekend in Detroit! It was awesome, and there is still a lot on my list that I need to see. I have visited before (April 2017, the year I did a road trip every month, completing successfully my New Years resolution), and checked out of few places worth noting if you are wanting to visit Detroit:
a) The Motown Museum- where the music of Motown started. No pictures are allowed inside, but it was amazing to see, with tons of memorabilia and things left exactly as they were when this house was used as a recording studio.
b) the Detroit Historical Museum, telling the story of Detroit from it’s start with cobbled-stoned streets, through the auto assembly line and the boom of the car industry to current times.
c) The Renaissance Center complex. A group of 7 interconnected skyscrapers. From here you can catch a ride on the People-Mover.
So that’s Detroit. I have a lot more I want to see, but I hope I’ve given you some good ideas that inspire your trip to Detroit.
Catching Katie 