Michelle took us to dinner to The Boathouse Restaurant on Friday evening . We arrived in time to see a beautiful pink sunset over West Grand Traverse Bay on the Old Mission Peninsula. We unfortunately forgot a camera, so won’t be sharing that view with you. If I (Cathy) had to pick my favorite restaurant of all time, this would be it. Michelle and I shared some delicacies for the more adventurous of us; Kobe tartare, seared foie gras and New Zealand rack of lamb. Steve stayed on the safe side with a Kobe New York (it was a bit pricey and he said that he wasn’t sure if he should eat it or frame it). We finished off with raspberry champagne sorbet and coconut panaceta. It was heaven. Thanks, sweet daughter!
The lake (Michigan) on a sunny day. Big boats, little boats and clear, cold water . . not what I expected. All of the Great Lakes have been spectacular so far, very much like freshwater, clean oceans. We will see Erie and Ontario in a couple of days when we get to the greater Toronto area.
It took us about six hours to get from Traverse City to our campsite in Ypsilanti. On the way, we passed the exit for the University of Michigan, Michigan Stadium and the Gerald Ford Library. All of these were relatively close to us (good planning, or just lucky?).
The first stop would be the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village. The Museum was huge, with multiple halls housing exhibits such as “Made in America – Power”, “Made in America – Manufacturing”, “Hero’s of the Sky”, “Fully Furnished”, “With Liberty and Justice for All”, “Railroad” and “Driving America”. We were overwhelmed upon entering the museum and found ourselves quickly running out of time.
We started with “Railroad” area, housing everything from the original Tom Thumb engine and cars, to a gigantic steam engine with two boilers and twelve traction wheels (actually two engines melded into one). We looked inside Henry’s private railcar manufactured by the Pullman company, a gigantic snow plow from the Canadian railroad, and numerous other pieces of important railroad equipment. This is Cathy looking at a 1850 era steam engine , the large 12 wheeler is directly behind her. As you can see, the coal car itself is larger than the entire engine she is looking at!
Next, we went through the “Driving America” exhibits, housing many incredible cars, including an original Bugatti, a Duesenberg, and my favorite, a 1956 Lincoln Continental MK II, which was the most expensive American car at that time, it looks like an enlarged 1956 Thunderbird. We also saw this bus, Blue Bird No. 1, which we captured for Ryan. (It did not have a white top, must pre-date CA standards). This bus once drove Georgia students to school. To my surprise, it took a while to go through this exhibits as it was Cathy’s favorite. Like all of the exhibits, we kind of “breezed” through as there was simply too much to see in the amount of time we had allocated.
This is Cathy looking at a jewelery display. This and a display of (mostly) American clocks dating from the mid 1700’s were in side halls. There was a complete civil war era large amethyst five-piece set that was our favorite.
“Hero’s of the Sky” included a Ford Tri-Motor, a Wright Brothers airplane, a few one-off racing airplanes, a DC3, Admiral Byrd’s tri-motor (a german design Fockker) that delivered him to Antarctica, a plane that Amelia Earhart flew, etc.
We left the main halls and walked to Greenfield Village (we paid in advance for both and feared we may spend too much time in the interior halls). This is Cathy with a Henry Ford statue.
This is Henry’s original home. The Village itself existed of many different Americana dwellings, factories and items that Henry acquired over time. He arranged them in a “village” that occupies hundreds of acres.
This is a statue of Thomas Edison. Edison and Ford were close friends and “vacationed/wintered” together in Ft. Myers. Ford preserved Edison’s Menlo Park laboratory, including equipment and the Ft. Myers laboratory and equipment. It was amazing the equipment that Edison used and the scope of his laboratories.
This is a Edison Power plant, ca 1886. While the building itself is a replica, the machinery inside is original. In addition to this power plant, there were several buildings housing Edison’s laboratories.
This is the Wright family home. The bicycle shop was downtown
This is the original home of William Holmes McGuffey, of “McGuffey’s Eclectic Readers” fame, considered America’s most famous reading, writing, arithmetic and grammar teaching programs in the past 200 years.
Original schoolhouse from rural Michigan. . .
Church that is still used occasionally . . .
Tkhis was Stephen Foster’s home. This home was filled with musical instruments dating from the mid 1800’s. The wheelchair ramp was obviously added later . .
Water driven grist mill in the village . . .
English limestone home, courtyard and outbuildings. I included a close up of one of the vintage “bulls-eye” window panes in this home.
View from the foyer of the limestone across the street. . .
Transportation within Greenfield Village was all vintage, including these buses, various types of Model T’s, horse-drawn carriages and 1850’s era steam trains.
Mid 1800’s high-end jewelery shop . . .
Henry liked trains. I had a HO set when I was younger, Henry lived in a different world, he collected real trains. He had multiple train engines, cars and attachments indoors and a complete train operation outdoors, including a rail yard, a roundhouse with three working steam engines similar to the one shown below in operation, miles of track, and of course a turntable. This facility is a working facility, there were mechanics performing real maintenance on the engines, reportedly one hour maintenance for each hour of operation on the steam-driven locomotives.
MISSING . . . .
The historical glass collection that I had hoped to see. Henry had several very rare and important flasks from the early 19th century that are unique. Unfortunately, the glass was being prepared for a special exhibit next spring. I did make it into the exhibit but was “caught” before I made it to where I was heading. Must have missed all of the (closed to the public signs). We will be returning to the Ford Museum and Greenfield Village as one day was not enough time to see everything. We think we will need two days next time to see what we missed.
Our next stop was at the Gerald Ford Presidential Library. This was a research center as the main Gerald Ford Presidential Library is located in Grand Rapids. Ford attended Michigan and was starting center on their football team in his senior year. His number has since been retired. We spent several hours “downstairs” looking at some personal letters, historical timelines and the office he used while in Michigan. This facility is located on the Michigan University campus. We were invited to go “upstairs” where the stacks were. There are millions (about 27 million) of documents, tapes and photographs available for researchers.
Of course we had to visit the University of Michigan. This street, very much like what you would see in Athens, is a typical college street. Food, drink and logo items. Could not find any Bulldog stuff here, only “Big Ten” items, whatever that is?
Travelling with the Schinglers 
Very informative and great pictures. UGA is doing absolutely horrible this year.
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Phil, one of the benefits of Alaska and Canada is that we didn’t have access to the news. Yes, I saw that when we were at a library in New York (WiFi). Glad to be home, but already planning our next trip.
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