Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Tales of a Michigoner, Prologue



My entire life has been spent in Michigan. I'm leaving it soon. I need help figuring out how to make this last Michigan summer my best.

Born and raised just outside of Detroit in Grosse Pointe, I grew up in a part of the state steeped in its industrial history. The houses that Ford built — on the River Rouge and Lake St. Clair — were perennial fixtures of childhood for me. So too were the old Tiger Stadium (demolished), the Hudson's building (imploded), and other pillars of Michigan's once (and future?) Motor City. And beyond the sprawl of southeast Michigan, summer here means water — the water of Lake Michigan, Lake Huron, and, less frequently but more dramatically, Lake Superior. There was also getting lost in the northwestern dunes, speeding across the waves in boats, always boats, eating, drinking, camping, road tripping, day tripping, running races, and doing nothing at all.


After a lifetime, I'm leaving this place. People who have grown up here frequently talk about their desire to get out of Michigan, with its urban decay, unemployment, and eight months of winter. People who visit have similar complaints, some legitimate and, as we've remarked previously, some less so. I used to be one of those complainers, but as it has recently grown more apparent that I would have to leave, the less I have wanted to.

Despite what people say, there's a lot of great stuff in Michigan. I should know because I've done a lot of it, but certainly not anywhere near all of it. Since this summer is my last chance to do so, I want to do all of the iconic and obscure, obligatory and wholly unnecessary, bucolic and museological, most healthful and damn outright self-destructive things unique to this pleasant peninsula that can possibly be crammed into a single summer.

I've got more than a few ideas for activities, but send me your suggestions. Here's a sampling of what I've got so far: go to a Tiger's game, go rock climbing at Grand Ledge, run in the Dexter-Ann Arbor half marathon, eat at Slow's, listen to jazz at Cliff Bell's, and several others. A few caveats: I'm kind of poor and I hate the Woodward Dream Cruise.

Over the course of the summer I'll be chronicling my last Michigan adventures. There's so much to this state that there's no way I can know about all of it — and I want to do, see, taste, and smell as much as possible before I'm a Michigoner.

12 comments:

  1. I don't endorse this move, but I do encourage you to spend some time in west Michigan. Hit the Big Lakes, Bell's, Bortell's Fish Fry, all that good stuff.

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  2. Speaking of breweries, what better way to start that the Short's to Short's Paddle? It's next Friday so you better start preparing/skipping finals if you want to hit it.

    (But also I second visiting Bell's and might I also add Founders, since that place is a happy place?)

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  3. A couple things I would endorse. Take a drive up Woodward (not during the cruise though), lots of different sights. Take another on US-12. And then another along US-23. If you've never done it before, the drive from Paradise to Sault Ste. Marie is pretty nice too if you take the lakeshore route (I believe this is a county route).

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  4. I can endorse taking a trip down US-12. I was out there this morning and it's really pretty.

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  5. Ray's Ice Cream in Royal Oak! Amazing.

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  6. if you're looking for road trips that are scenic, try M-22 that goes from Grand Traverse County out the Leelanau Peninsula and back into Benzie County. It's a great loop, most of it is in the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park, and there are plenty of fun, touristy towns along the way to stop for ice cream, or to jump in Lake Michigan ;)

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  7. also lots of festivals up here that are fun in the summer: BlissFest and/or Dunegrass and Blues Festival (hippies and music), Traverse City Film Festival (movies and Michael Moore), Cherry Festival (speaks for itself), Polka Festival (drunken debauchery and dancing), and many more. Check out AbsoluteMichigan.com for some ideas...jump off the pier in Frankfort, morel mushroom hunting (just a few weeks away, if this snow would ever leave), skinny dipping at Northbar Lake (run between the little lake and Lake Michigan), camping on South and/or North Manitou Islands, Beaver Island (touristy and full of Mormon history), Mackinac Island, the U.P.'s "Mystery Spot" and "Christmas" town, Cherry Bowl Drive-in Movie Theater...

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  8. M-22 is overrated....M-119 is where it is at...

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  9. M-32 west from Gaylord to M-66 to Charlevoix is also real nice.

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  10. M168: only about 2 miles long, but ends at the beach! (about midsummer it is being turned over to the village of Elberta from the state: apparently they dont want it anymore!)

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  11. Did we all forget that Benji is afraid to drive?

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  12. Yes! Take a drive up M-119 through the "Tunnel of Trees" landing at Leggs Inn for some real Polish food and good beer and an incredibly interesting atmoshphere. Make sure you get there early enough to score a decent spot out in the patio/garden to see one of the most amazing Michigan sunsets ever. Really, EVER.
    http://www.legsinn.com/photos.html

    ....The wineries in the Leelanau Peninsula are always fun too. I particularly recommend L. Mawby.

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