MICHIGAN TRAVEL TIPS
FROM
THE HOLOGLOBE PRESS
(The 33th Edition)by
Victor Edward Swanson,
Publisherwww.hologlobepress.com
RULES OF USE
The reports and stories contained on this Web page have been put together with information taken from "The Victor Swanson Fabulous Files of Places to See in Michigan and Wisconsin" and with information obtained from operators and staffers of tourist attractions and from press releases, Web sites, and other sources. The reports and stories are provided as a public service by Victor Swanson and The Hologlobe Press. Almost all persons and entities, such as staffers of radio stations, may freely use the materials; neither AAA Michigan nor any employee of AAA Michigan may use, distribute, download, transmit, copy, or duplicate any of the material presented on this page in any way or through any means.
- - - Travel Thoughts for Everyone - - -
Pretend today is Monday, January 8, 2007, because it is the day during which I found interesting real things to tell you about in this edition of Michigan Travel Tips and it is the day during which I finished writing the main structure for this edition of Michigan Travel Tips (some parts, I had written out on various days of the week before January 8, 2007).
On January 7, 2007, I took a walk along the beach of Huron Beach of the Hammond Bay area of Lake Huron at around the noon hour and one o'clock hour (in the afternoon). I began by heading south from the house at which I was staying and had arrived at the day before; I was dressed for winter weather, wearing several sweatshirts under a mostly yellow wind-breaker-type jacket, which I had only recently bought, encouraged to buy it several weeks previously so that I would have a jacket that would stand out or help me stand out to others in the woods. I walked about a half mile, and then I turned around and headed back the way I had come, and after going about a quarter mile, I saw in the water--about three feet out--a big slotted-type spoon, and I immediately wondered if the slotted-type spoon was some historical piece, maybe made of silver and maybe from a ship that had traveled on Lake Huron. I quickly returned to the house and put on boots--waterproof boots--that I had recently bought, which I knew could be used to walk in deep snow and to walk a little way in to Lake Huron, such as when the water would be cold, such as near 32-degrees Fahrenheit, and I returned to the place where the spoon was. I retreived the spoon. The spoon was about eleven-inches long, and it was no great antiquity, and, in fact, it was nothing more than a stainless-steel spoon with two slots in the scoop part. On the handle was this text: "Interpur Stainless Japan." (Okay, maybe someone on a Japanese ship had lost it. While walking north, back toward the house, I gave the spoon a name--"My stone-scooping spoon." And the spoon became important in helping me retrieve what I would later find on my walk.
What I later found I will tell you about after I pass along information about some tourist attractions in Michigan, which is the purpose of every edition of Michigan Travel Tips.
Over the summer, I accumulated a lot of brochures about places in Michigan for people to see and came across numerous newspaper articles about places to see in Michigan, but it has only within the last month that I have officially typed in notes about some of the places that I learned about through the gathered material into my electronic files, and some of the places are in the Lower Peninsula and some of the places are in the Upper Peninsula. I have notes on two places that I learned about in the Upper Peninsula to talk about in the next two paragraphs, but before I provide any information about them, I have to make a statement. Remember: I do not verify the quality of everyplace that I report on in the editions of Michigan Travel Tips--I only use the editions of Michigan Travel Tips to give you information about places you may wish to see, which is information you might not otherwise come across, since, for instance, television stations, radio stations, regular newspapers, and general-purpose magazines provide little information on the wide variety of things and vast number of things to see in Michigan, and often a television station, radio station, a newspaper, or a magazine will only cover the usual big places to see in the state or only cover a few of the things that exist in the local area of the television station, radio station, newspaper, or magazine.
For the first time, I have made a note in my files about a place to visit in Wallace, which is in Menominee County of the Upper Peninsula (Menominee County is the southern-most county in the Upper Peninsula and touches Wisconsin). I learned there is a zoo at Wallace, and that zoo is called the "DeYoung Family Zoo." From an advertisement about the place that I found, which first made me aware that the place existed, I learned the place has lions, tigers, cougars, bears, monkeys, and wolves, and the place has a petting zoo and a reptile house. Through the Web site for the DeYoung Family Zoo, I learned more, such as, generally speaking, in the fall and winter, the place is only open to regular visits on Saturday and Sunday (as a rule it is open six days a week in the remainder of the year, being open from Tuesday through Sunday). My files about places to see in Michigan now note that the DeYoung Family Zoo is along Highway 577 at Wallace and can be found on the Internet (at www.thedeyoungfamilyzoo.com).
This past October (2006), I was traveling around in the Keweenaw Peninsula of the Upper Peninsula (the Upper Peninsula is a big peninsula, and the Keweenaw Peninsula is a part of the Upper Peninsula and is regarded as a peninsula, which, of course, is a piece of land that is surrounded by water on three sides), and, during the trip, I never did see a place called "Prospector's Paradise," though it was there to be seen. The place is a business at which rocks and minerals are for sale, but I now list the place in my files of places to see in Michigan because it does have within it what is called by the owners the "Museum of Ancient Copper Culture." There is no charge to see the "Museum of Ancient Copper Culture," which seems to have a "copper" theme. Prospector's Paradise is located at a town called Mohawk--particularly at 59691 US-41 in Mohawk--which is about three miles north of Calumet (Mohawk is in Keweenaw County, and Calumet is in Houghton County, and both counties are a part of the Keweenaw Peninsula). Generally speaking, Prospector's Paradise is open from mid-May through November each year, so, right now, you cannot visit it, even if you were going to be near it.
This summer, I twice visited the offices of the Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association at Mackinaw City (the Lower Peninsula); the Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association, which is informally referred to as "GLLKA" (which is pronounced "Gli-Ka"), is a not-for-profit entity that is involved in preserving lighthouses and promoting the lighthouses that exist in Michigan to everyone. The offices of GLLKA are located at 206 Lake Street, and on one trip to the offices of GLLKA, I was with a friend of mine who bought items there. The place has books and other items related to lighthouses and the Great Lakes. One of the items that my friend bought was a model of The Mackinaw, the original Coast Guard cutter or icebreaker of the Great Lakes (in operation from 1944 to 2006), which is now docked permanently at Mackinaw City (at a dock associated with Shepler's Mackinac Island Ferry). The model that my friend bought was a limited-availability model (at the time), because it was a model of The Mackinaw as she was originally painted--mostly painted white. For sale at the time that my friend bought the model was an edition of The Mackinaw as she was painted in recent years--mostly painted red (so that she would stand out amongst the white ice and white snow of winter on the Great Lakes). Incidentally, the new ship called The Mackinaw is mostly painted red, and the home port for the ship is Cheboygan (of Cheboygan County in the Lower Peninsula). Although it is winter and although lighthouses that normally are open to tours in the summer are closed, the offices for GLLKA are open at this time of the year. As a rule, the offices of GLLKA are open from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. from December 1 to April 1 on weekdays and open from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. in the remainder of the year on weekdays.
In the previous edition of Michigan Travel Tips, I passed along information about new things that exist at a few of the places to see in Michigan, such as the Flint Institute of Arts and the Detroit Historical Museum, the latter of which is under the day-to-day control of the Detroit Historical Society, which also controls the operation of the Dossin Great Lakes Museum, which is on Belle Isle of Detroit (in Wayne County of the Lower Peninsula). The Detroit Historical Society closed the Dossin Great Lakes Museum at the end of December 2006, so that the museum could be renovated, and, at the moment, it looks as if the renovation project will last till mid-March 2007, when there will be a grand reopening of the museum. For now, remember, the Dossin Great Lakes Museum, which has been around in the current building on Belle Isle since 1961, is closed for renovation.
Let me talk about only the radio stations and television stations in the Detroit area for a moment here (though the topic is probably better suited as a topic for editions of T.H.A.T., which are Internet-only publications about television that I have been producing regularly every month since April 2004). I could argue well Detroit-area radio stations and television stations are nearly useless in providing information about things to see around the Detroit area and in Michigan and in providing information about new places to see in the Detroit area and in Michigan, and radio stations and television stations provide almost no information about changes or improvements that take place at places to see. Years ago, such as in the 1960s, radio stations and television stations used to do much more in providing news about changes going on at places to see in Michigan.
Here is information that I did not hear about or see about through a report on a radio station or a report on a television station, and it seems very likely you did not hear this information or see this information through a radio station or a television station already. In the southeastern region of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan is a group of big parks that belong to what is called the Huron-Clinton Metropark system (there are thirteen parks in the system). One of the parks is located at Belleville (of Wayne County), which is a little west of Detroit, and that park is called the Lower Huron Metropark. The Huron-Clinton Metroparks News for Winter 2006-2007 reports that, on August 31, 2006, there was a groundbreaking ceremony at Lower Huron Metropark for what is called the "Turtle Cove Family Aquatic Center," which, in essence, I list in my files now under "water parks" (in Michigan). The short article in the Huron-Clinton Metroparks News noted the water park will be opened to everyone some time in 2008 (and until then the current pool at Lower Huron Metropark, which has normally been open during the summer seasons, will continue to exist).
Now, here is information that I could put under a category labeled "I am not too surprised" (and that statement might give you the indication that this paragraph contains a little bit of commentary on my part, and it should give you that indication). In the mid-1900s, the Kellogg Company made available to the public short tours of the cereal-making plant in Battle Creek (in Calhoun County of the Lower Peninsula), and, for instance, several times in the 1960s, when I was a boy, I was able to see the cereal-making plant. (I have to be vague here on dates in the next sentence, because I am not able to get the proper dates, right now, which are not too important for you to have). A little while after the 1960s, the Kellogg Company stopped giving tours of the cereal-making plant at Battle Creek. In 1998, a place called "Kellogg's Cereal City USA," a museum of sorts (which also promoted the Kellogg Company), was opened, and one thing that the museum had was an exhibit that simulated how corn flakes were made (in the 1960s, I saw how "Kellogg's Corn Flakes" were made). On Sunday, January 7, 2007, the Detroit Free Press (a newspaper based in Detroit) published an article that noted that Kellogg's Cereal City USA was closed on Thursday, January 4, 2007 (Rathbun, Andy. "Cereal City closing leaves debt to taxpayers in the air." Detroit Free Press, 7 January 2007, p. 6B.). You can no longer see Kellogg's Cereal City USA, and you should tell others that they can no longer see it (so that they do not go to the place and find it closed). It seems to me, for tourists, a place with that has, for one, an exhibit that simulates the making of cereal is not like a plant that shows the making of cereal, and maybe that is one reason Kellogg's Cereal City USA was closed down.
I now return to my story about my walk along Lake Huron on January 7, 2007, which was a day when there was almost no snow on the ground in the northeastern quarter of Lower Michigan and along the beaches of Lake Huron in the region, which is unusual--there is usually a lot of snow on the ground in the northeastern quarter of the Lower Peninsula in January, though not as much snow as there usually is in much of northwestern quarter of the Lower Peninsula and especially in the northern half of the Upper Peninsula. While making the walk along the beach, I was looking for a particular object--a particular type of stone. I walked for at least a half mile, and then all of a sudden, I noticed a rock, which was about six-inches across. It had a conglomerate structure, and it was dirty--really dirty--and I could not really see what it was made of, but it looked as if some of the parts of the mixture were red stones, and that made me think I might have found an example of what I was looking for--a "pudding stone" (which I talked about in the twenty-ninth edition of Michigan Travel Tips, which can be reached right now by hitting the link: Travel #29). I used my newly found spoon to remove sand and dirt from around the rock (the spoon came in handy). Then, I carried the stone back to the house, and, there, I cleaned it off. Yes, I had found it--I had found a stone that was a conglomerate of smaller stones and it was not a weathered and rounded-off piece of concrete. However, the stone was not a true "pudding stone," but it is very close to a puddng stone, if not what might be called a close relative of the pudding stone. I have to report--It seems I am getting closer in my search for a pudding stone.
Your travel tips of Michigan in this edition of Michigan Travel Tips are:
The DeYoung Family Zoo, Wallace, Menominee County, the Upper Peninsula.
The Dossin Great Lakes Museum, Belle Isle of Detroit, Wayne County, the Lower Peninsula.
Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association, Mackinaw City, Cheboygan County, the Lower Peninsula.
Kellogg's Cereal City USA, Battle Creek, Calhoun County, the Lower Peninsula. (Note: Closed--probably forever.)
Lower Huron Metropark, Belleville, Wayne County, the Lower Peninsula.
Prospector's Paradise (and the "Museum of Ancient Copper Culture" contained within), Mohawk, Keweenaw County, the Upper Peninsula.
- - - Public Service Copy for Broadcasters (four pieces) - - -
Number One:
In the winter, some of the "rest areas" along main
roads in Michigan are closed, and the type of rest
area that is closed is the type that can be called a
"rustic" rest area, often having not much more than
toilet houses and fresh water. Many rest areas
around the state are open throughout the year, and
one such rest area is the new rest area along eastbound
I-94 in the Chelsea area, which is in Washtenaw County
of the Lower Peninsula. The new rest area was opened
up in November and replaced a formerly existing rest
area. It is possible you might use that new rest area
someday--maybe during a trip to Chelsea. Chelsea is
where "The Purple Rose Theatre Company" is
based--that theatre company founded by movie-actor
and stage-actor Jeff Daniels, who wrote the play
"Escanaba in da Moonlight." Even on moonlight nights,
the Chelsea rest area on I-94 is open, so enjoy your
safe traveling in Michigan in the moonlight.
###
Number Two:
From 1944 to 2006, a ship called The Mackinaw
was an important icebreaker for the United States
Coast Guard and shippers on the Great Lakes. Today,
another ship called The Mackinaw is an important
icebreaker for the United States Coast Guard and
shippers on the Great Lakes. That first ship called
The Mackinaw is now docked at Mackinaw City near
the famous Mackinac Bridge, and the ship is under the
care of "Icebreaker Mackinaw Maritime Museum, Inc.,"
and it looks as if, during the 2007 summer tourist
season, the old Mackinaw will be an important tourist
attraction at Mackinaw City. Often museums need
volunteers to run them, and today Icebreaker Mackinaw
Maritime Museum, Inc., is looking for volunteers to
work on the old Mackinaw this upcoming tourist
season. If you would like to help present The Mackinaw
to the world as a volunteer, contact Icebreaker
Mackinaw Maritime Museum, Inc., at Mackinaw City.
###
Number Three:
When you make plans for a long-distance trip, you
try to think of places that you can see in the time that
you will have, and if you were to make plans to travel
in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, you might make
plans to spend time at a zoo there. Unbeknownst to
many people, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan does
have zoos, and maybe the least known is the DeYoung
Family Zoo, which is at Wallace. The DeYoung Family
Zoo, which was opened for the first time in 1990, has
such animals as lions, tigers, cougars, bears, monkeys,
and wolves, and it has a reptile house and a petting
zoo. Although it is winter, the DeYoung Family Zoo
is open to visitors on weekends. During much of the
year, it is open from Tuesday through Sunday. If you're
making plans for a long-distance trip in the Upper
Peninsula, think about seeing the DeYoung Family
Zoo, which is at Wallace. Buckle up the children,
and enjoy your safe traveling in Michigan!
###
Number Four:
Here is a little news from The Hologlobe Press,
which publishes a free Internet-only publication entitled
Michigan Travel Tips every month, and to make sure
you are aware--each edition of Michigan Travel Tips
has information about places to see in the Upper
Peninsula of Michigan and the Lower Peninsula of
Michigan. This month, The Hologlobe Press reports
that some tourist attractions that a person would expect
to be open at this time of the year are closed and
cannot be seen. Kellogg's Cereal City USA at Battle
Creek is closed--it was closed on January 4, and it
looks as if it will be closed for good. Also closed is
the Dossin Great Lakes Museum at Belle Isle of
Detroit. The good news is--the Dossin Great Lakes
Museum is only closed for renovation and will be
opened up again around mid-March. That is news
from The Hologlobe Press, which can be found on
the Internet at www.hologlobepress.com.
###
- - - Contact Information - - -
The Hologlobe Press
Postal Box 20551
Ferndale, Michigan 48220-0551
The United States of Americacopyright c. 2007
File date: 10 January 2007To see the next edition of Michigan Travel Tips,
click on: Travel #34.
To see the previous edition of Michigan Travel Tips,
click on: Travel #32.
To see the catalog page for Michigan Travel Tips,
click on: Travel.
To go to the main page of The Hologlobe Press,
click on: www.hologlobepress.com.
###