Quick Michigan Trip - Ford Museum, Frankenmuth, Saginaw, Bay City...

[antmaril]

We love the chicken dinners in Frankenmuth! We go several times a year and always eat at Zehnder’s (they take reservations). Is it the best chicken I’ve ever had? No, but it is very good and we LOVE all the sides, especially the buttered noodles! . The store and bakery downstairs is wonderful. Gifts, wine, baked goods and candy. A must! The Cheese Haus on Main Street is also a must. The Bavarian Inn (across from Zehnder’s) also has a bakery and shops downstairs. Frankenmuth is a beautiful little town. Bronner’s is huge! It will take you a while to get through it, but it is worth the time.

You will love the Ford Museum. As someone else mentioned, The Dearborn Inn is closed for renovations. Greenfield Village is also worth a visit, if the weather is nice.

Enjoy your visit to Michigan. It’s a beautiful state! Next time, you might want to head to northern Michigan, the UP and Mackinac Island! Wonderful!

 

[mmbrad02]

What time of year are you going? I went in September and frankenmuth was very nice then. We stayed at the spring hill suites using points. We also stopped in Detroit on the way up from Kentucky and crossed over into Canada for lunch. Not doable if you don’t have passports, but if you do, it’s fun!

Four more days until we leave for MI! I'm getting excited for our little getaway.

I wanted to inquire about your time in Canada - was it easy to enter/exit? When we first started planning for this trip, I was ignorant to how close we would be to Canada. We do have passports and I pitched the idea to my husband last week that we should go, just to say we had! But he thought it was not the best idea, as we could get in delays trying to cross in and out of the countries. What are your thoughts?

 

[kymom99]

Four more days until we leave for MI! I'm getting excited for our little getaway.

I wanted to inquire about your time in Canada - was it easy to enter/exit? When we first started planning for this trip, I was ignorant to how close we would be to Canada. We do have passports and I pitched the idea to my husband last week that we should go, just to say we had! But he thought it was not the best idea, as we could get in delays trying to cross in and out of the countries. What are your thoughts?

It took no time at all. I wasn’t driving so the details are fuzzy, but it was very easy. We are at a waterfront restaurant and walked a few blocks along the river. It was a fun little diversion.

 

[mmbrad02]

Just back from our MI getaway and thought I would report in on what we actually ended up doing

The drive up was uneventful, we drove straight to Bay City for my nephews weigh in. They came up short for getting a ticket to Nationals, but caught a total of 10 fish over the two day tournament and did well. After the weigh in we walked through Bay City which we thought was lovely. They were setting up for a festival that would start the next day. We loved the murals, the Friendship shell, etc. We ate dinner at Beavers which was a hit for our entire party. I would love to have more of their fries as we speak

We did end up spending the first night in Saginaw - while we didn't specifically have anything going on there, we were finished in Bay City for this trip and it put us closer to Frankenmuth but was a lot less expensive than Frankenmuth itself. I have corporate discounts with Marriott and Hilton and we were able to stay at the Fairfield Inn for $113 taxes and all. By the time we arrived it was already 8pm or so, and we left the next morning by 9:30am so all we really needed was a safe clean place to lay our heads.

We spent the next day in Frankenmuth - we started with Bronners and wow, that place is neat, amazing, and overwhelming. We enjoyed taking in all the photo ops and browsing the ornaments. We had lunch reservations at noon, so we didn't quite get finished there before we needed to leave. We ate lunch at the Bavarian Inn; of the two famous chicken places, this lunch menu seemed to suit our party best. Lunch was good - I wouldn't need to go back, but have zero regrets going. The theming was cute and we all enjoyed it. Then we began walking through all the shops and such. Unfortunately the afternoon had rain in the forecast so we had to move a little faster than perhaps we would have otherwise, but we still saw a lot. Loved all the theming. Tried chocolate cheese at the Cheese Haus, bought taffy at the Taffy shop, and we went in Rau's Country store as well. It was fun just going down the street and back and taking in all the sites and theming. We enjoyed crossing the covered bridge. When the rain started coming, we headed back to Bronners to finish up our shopping there. Then we headed south for our next hotel stay...

We opted to stay in Romulus right next to the airport because we were going to the Ford area the next day and my sister and her family were going to Ypsilanti, so this put us centrally located for both. It worked well, again we basically arrived in time to grab some dinner and swim, and called it a night.

The Henry Ford museum was amazing! We arrived around 10am and bought tickets to both that and Greenfield VIllage (we had discounts). We walked a ton, I know we missed a lot, but we saw a lot and loved it. I could easily return to Greenfield Village again when we had more time - We listened to Noah Webster's House tour and The Wright Brothers but on others we had to quickly go through on our own because we knew we didn't have time for the entire place. We hit the road for Kentucky around 4pm, pretty much exhausted from a whirlwind weekend but have such good memories!

Thank you for your help in our planning!