AT#1012 - Travel to Detroit, Michigan

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1:00Welcome to the I Can't Sleep Podcast with Benjamin Boster. If you're tired of sleepless nights, you'll love the I Can't Sleep Podcast. I help quiet your mind by reading random articles from across the web to bore you to sleep with my soothing voice. Each episode provides enough interesting content to hold your attention, and then your mind lets you drift off. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. That's I Can't Sleep with Benjamin Boster. Amateur Traveler Episode 1,012. Today Amateur Traveler talks about museums and markets, pizza and conies, automobiles and

2:00Motown as we go to Detroit, Michigan. This is Chris Christensen from Amateur Traveler. Let's talk about Detroit. I would like to welcome the show Cassandra Sugarman, who is coming to us from Detroit, Michigan, and come to talk to us about Detroit, Michigan. Sandra, welcome to the show. It's great to be here Chris. I see you're coming to us from Detroit. You're coming to us from Detroit area. Correct, yeah. So I live in Royal Oak, Michigan, which is a suburb just about 1520 minutes north of Detroit. Excellent. And you live in Detroit, so that's your connection with Detroit. So that one's fairly obvious. Why should someone go to Detroit? Yeah, so why someone should go to Detroit? And I think specifically now and in the years to come is the story of revival of Detroit. So many people associate Detroit with the automotive industry.

3:02It definitely is the backbone of Detroit. And it really weaves in with the history of the city. So Henry Ford and the creation of the assembly line really started taking off in the 1900s, and really built up the city, brought in a lot of immigrants to the area. For example, the Dearborn area where Ford is headquartered has a lot of Middle Eastern population. Lots of really great Middle Eastern food. So it really created the start of this melting pot, if you will, built on the auto industry, and really took off the city. But as people also know, the auto industry and the history of the auto industry has been very sicklec economically. And that has also affected the city here as well. The three, we call them the big three automotive manufacturers in the US are all located here in Detroit. So you have Ford, you have GM, and then you have Solantis previously fiat Chryslerd's gone through a couple of mergers over the years.

4:06They all have a presence here, all of the supply base that supplies the American automotive companies are here. And so the economy of the city is very much intertwined with the automotive industry. And particularly in the great recession of 2008 Detroit was hit pretty hard. Two of the three automotive companies, Solantis, NAL and GM had to take government bailouts. Ford pretty much had to put most everything on the line to get through this time. And in 2014, the city of Detroit actually had to file for chapter nine bankruptcy. But the cool thing about it is that it didn't end there. There was revival. And so I moved here to Metro Detroit in 2014. And through my time here, I have just seen complete revitalization of the city. So there's been gentrification that has happened where buildings that were once completely abandoned cities that were hit really hard or neighborhoods that were hit really hard artists have come in and developed wonderful murals on the sides of abandoned buildings and instructors.

5:16There have been a great food scene that's awakened in the city. Packers of gentrification that grew into neighborhoods, lots of shops, bakeries, coffee shops, Dan Gilbert, who's founder of the rocket companies. Like rocket mortgage is also headquartered here. And he really kick started a lot of investment in the core downtown. But then there's also like I said, a lot of artists and things that have taken off and created the city that it is today. And so I say revival because it's very unique that Detroit had the big boom of the automotive industry in the 1900s. We had the great recession and kind of the abandonment that a lot of people saw pictures of. And now people transforming that into what is the new Detroit. And it's just a really cool thing to see. In addition to revival, there's also a music history associated with Detroit. So yeah, so you can't really go on without acknowledging Motown and the birth of Motown in Detroit.

6:21In the 1960s, Barry Gordy Jr. launched the recording label Motown here in the city of Detroit. It brought to the American people, great artists like Diana Ross in the Supreme, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye. And there's also been a lot of other great music names that have gone through the city, Aretha Franklin, Kid Rock. He's not from Detroit and of itself, but one of the suburbs and then also Eminem. If you know the Eminem movie eight mile, that is actually on the northern side of Detroit. It is the road that kind of separates the city of Detroit from the suburbs. And so that's what is being referenced in his movie. He also opened up a restaurant in Detroit called Mom Spaghetti, which is homage to his lyric, Lou's Yourself. So you can come to Detroit and have mom spaghetti and listen to Lou's Yourself while you're driving down eight mile. So yeah, with the music history, the revival, the cuisine, there's just a lot to experience here in Detroit.

7:24Excellent. What I tend to, are you going to recommend for us? Yeah, so I have a seven day itinerary plan. Just a couple of logistical things about the seven day itinerary. I think you can definitely spend a week here in Detroit, really dive into the city, understand it, and be busy every single day. But if you did want to shorten this itinerary to something, say like three or four days, you definitely could take bits and pieces of it and shorten it. Detroit is located in a really good location in the Midwest of the United States. So it's actually just a little over a four hour drive to Chicago. So you can pair it with Chicago if you wanted a little over four hour drive to Toronto. And you're also close to Northern Michigan and Western Michigan. I know Chris that you have some really great episodes around Northern Michigan, Western Michigan that you could also pair with Detroit if you wanted to. So I guess that's seven days, but you could shorten it, take pieces of it if you wanted to.

8:25Also, if you wanted to align your trip with some events, Detroit does have a number of really cool events that they host every year that you could pair with this itinerary. So the Detroit Auto Show that happens every January at the main conference center in downtown Detroit, Kobo Hall. It's now called Huntington Place. But pretty much every single automotive manufacturer around the world comes to Detroit. You can try any new car that you want. See a lot of cool concept cars. That's a fun event that you could add to your trip. In August every year, there's the Woodward Dream Cruise. So that is on Woodward Avenue. It's known as the spine of Detroit. It's like a south north street that's angled through the city. It actually was the world's first concrete road. Okay. Yeah. And it's close by to where a lot of the first automotive assembly lines were Henry Ford perfected the assembly line where they were located like the Ford Highland Park plant.

9:33And we see cruise here. We're not on a boat. We're cruising the street says we would do back in the I would say in the 50s. But I think my friends did that in the 70s, but. Exactly. It's cruising in your car. We love the automobile industry here in Detroit. So everybody gets out their old Corvette's Mustangs and cruises along Woodward Avenue. People set out their lawn chairs and just watch and live like you're living in like you said. The 60s, 70s. And all three of the big three automotive manufacturers take over a part of the city. So Ford takes over Furndale, which is the southern most suburb of Detroit on Woodward Avenue. You can go to Mustang alley see all kinds of old Mustangs GM takes over Birmingham, which is a more northern suburb. Where you can go and see all the old Corvettes and then Stellantis takes more of the northern side and Pontiac.

10:33But it's a really unique experience to come in August for that. One thing before we go too much further a clarification for our non U.S. listeners or potentially for our U.S. listeners who are geography challenge when we talk about Detroit as the Midwest. That might be a little confusing to someone who's not from the U.S. Because if you look at a map, it is in the eastern half of the country probably in the middle east to west in the eastern half of the country. So the Midwest is located in the east because it used to be the west and it used to be the Midwest. And we still call it that to this day. Yeah, that's good point. Yeah, so I guess a couple more events in October every year is the Detroit marathon. And this is really cool for runners because it's an international half and full marathon. You start in Detroit, you run over the ambassador bridge into Canada, which is really cool.

11:34Run along Windsor and then you return to the U.S. through the Detroit Windsor tunnel and actually get to run underneath the Detroit River. So that's also a very unique experience every October. And so these are just a couple of events. There's other events in Detroit that you could pair your trip with. There's also a lot of really good concert venues in Detroit. I mentioned it being a music city. The Little Cesar's Arena, which hosts the Red Wing's hockey team has a lot of good concerts hosted at it every year as well as Ford Field, which is the football stadium. But we have a lot of unique concert venues like the Detroit Masonic Temple, San Andrews Hall. There's a lot of really good music that comes through the city as well that you can pair with your trip. Okay. All right, so I guess diving into the itinerary on day one. I have as kind of your travel in day and getting settled in downtown Detroit.

12:34As I mentioned, Detroit is a heavily automotive focused city. So you are going to need a car for the majority of this itinerary. I do have a little bit of it where you can use public transportation. There is a free tram bus called the Q line, which runs up and down Woodward Avenue, which you can use for part of this itinerary. But other than that, you will need a car to efficiently get around the city. I would also suggest staying in the core downtown area. You could stay anywhere between core downtown by campus marshes, which is the main plaza of the city located near the Detroit River all the way up to Midtown. And I would say anywhere between those two places along Woodward Avenue, just so you're within walking distance of Woodward Avenue to get to the queue line that would make it easiest for you to get around. And also hop in your car when you need to. So first day you get into the city, you go downtown, get settled into your hotel.

13:38And the first thing that I would do is make your way to Woodward Avenue. I know that I mentioned it a couple times now, but it truly is the spine of the city. And campus marshes is located right on Woodward Avenue. This is the main plaza of the city. In the summer they usually have it ducked out as like a beach theme. And at the winter time there's a big Christmas tree with ice skating. So it's also fun to go around the holidays. And that's where I would start off. Then I would make your way walking through the city exploring and start making your way over to the Detroit River Walk. So this is a really nice walking path that runs along downtown Detroit. You can see the Ambassador Bridge. You can see Windsor Canada across the Detroit River. It just has some really nice views of the Detroit skyline. And as you're walking over to the Detroit River Walk, you'll walk by the Joelouis Fist downtown, which is also a symbol of Detroit.

14:41So Joelouis was the boxer. Yep, the boxer yet he is an icon of Detroit famous boxer who was known for beating German boxer Max Schmeling. And it was like a symbolism of democracy over fascism. And so he's a prominent figure in Detroit. And there's a famous fist statue that that's in downtown Detroit that is definitely a not miss stop. That's the end of day one. When we're at the River Walk, the riverfront, is there anything particular we're going to do there? Spots that we should stop at while we're there. I would recommend just walking along and strolling seeing the Detroit skyline. You'll see the Renaissance Center, which is an iconic building of the downtown Detroit. It is where the GM headquarters is located. And there's also an area there if you have kids with a carousel.

15:43So that's like a nice place to stop if you have kids as well. And a splash pad again seasonal in the summer. Yes, yep, that is down there as well. Yeah. Cool. Okay. I guess also for the end of day one, I have some of my favorite restaurant recommendations sprinkled throughout the itinerary. But in this core downtown area, I would recommend a shout out to write in company. It's a really great small plates restaurant, new American restaurant in downtown Detroit just located off a woodward a little bit. So yeah, that is day one. Okay. And then I say James Beard nominated restaurant if that means something to our foodie friends here. Oh, nice. I didn't realize they had a James your nomination as well. That's awesome. Have you ever dreamt of wandering the secluded icy blue glaciers of Alaska? Or shimming to the top of a minaret in summer camp for a secret city view?

16:43That is the heart of Wayfinder life-changing travel, a podcast about the journeys that transform us. Come along. Season two begins now. So get ready to discover yourself and the world. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. If you ever wondered why we call French fries French fries or why something is the greatest thing since sliced bread, there are answers to those questions. Everything everywhere daily is a podcast for curious people who want to learn more about the world around them. Every day you'll learn something new about things you never knew you didn't know. Subjects include history, science, geography, mathematics, and culture. If you're a curious person and want to learn more about the world you live in, just subscribe to everything everywhere daily wherever you cast your pod. All right. So then day two is going outside of the core downtown and making your way up to Midtown.

17:46Midtown is a university district of the city. It's where Wayne State University is located. And it's also where all of the museums are located as well. So before you head up to Midtown, if you're in the core downtown area, I recommend stopping and getting breakfast at Dime Store. It's an excellent breakfast restaurant located in the core downtown not too far from campus, Marcious. And what you can do is you can hop on the queue line. Like I said, this is a free tram that runs up and down Woodward. I believe it stops every 20 to 25 minutes. So it's pretty easy to find the next timed tram and hop on it. And you are going to take that up to the Canfield Street stop. And I recommend stopping at Canfield Street because this is a street that has a lot of iconic Detroit brands on it. So the first stop is actually a chocolate shop.

18:47It's called Bon Bon Bon. It is, yeah, for the French listeners, so Bon Bon, but there's three bonds, they make these little package chocolates of all different flavors. Bon Bon, but that be good. Oh, yeah, that's already redundant there. But yeah, they're these little packaged rectangular chocolates, all different flavors. It's a really unique place to stop at. Also on this street is Shinola Detroit. So Shinola is a key Detroit brand. There's also a hotel, a Shinola hotel in downtown. They're a watchmaker and they also make leather goods. They're really all over the world now. But they started in Detroit. That's where they were founded. So you can stop in the Shinola store. And also there is a car heart store on this street as well. Car heart is also headquartered in Detroit. So you can stop and check out a car heart store there and get a part of the city as well.

19:49Okay. And I feel like I need to explain why I laughed at the name Shinola. Some of you have a certain age who understood why. But basically the Shinola watch company name themselves after an old shoe polish company, well known company. And there used to be a well known expression that someone didn't know. Excrement from Shinola that they didn't know what was going on. So that's what hit me when we were talking about that. But you were saying. In the afternoon, I recommend going to museums. And depending on timing, you could either get lunch before or after during the museums that you're going to go see. In this area for lunch, I recommend going to a bail bob bear. It's an East African restaurant. It's also James. We are nominated. It's near the museum district of Midtown. And in the museum district, it would be a lot to go to both of these museums in one afternoon.

20:49So you probably pick one. You could try to go to both if you would like. But the two are the Detroit Institute of Arts. This is the art museum in Detroit. It has a lot of really great exhibits. It has a good impressionist exhibit. But what I think is really unique about this particular art museum is the Detroit industry murals by Diego Rivera. So he depended the Ford Rouge plant. And when you walk into the courtyard of the DIA, you can just get immersed with these big murals of the automotive assembly line. Interesting. I did not know he had ever done any paintings of automotive assembly lines. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you can see that at the Detroit Institute of Arts, the DIA. It's a really wonderful art museum. I highly recommend it. And then also in this area is the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American history. I will say this definitely is an emotional experience.

21:51So just be prepared when you go to the exhibit, but they do a really great job. They walk through the entire history of African Americans. They start with kind of the African tribes and they talk about the slave trade, the underground railroad, emancipation, Jim Crow laws. And then they move into going through a lot of prominent black figures. And then they also tie it back to specific stories in Detroit. So they cover really the US, the world and Detroit as well. It's a really well done museum. Also recommend stopping in there as well. Just a couple of things to wrap out this day. So there is a James Beard winning pastry shop in this area called Wardah, Pettisserie. It's a very good, highly recommend stopping in there for coffee and afternoon treat. And then also this area, I feel, has some of the best restaurants in the Detroit area.

22:51So you might have to come back to Midtown a couple nights during your stay. Okay. Midtown area for dinner, Selden standard, I highly recommend it is a James Beard nominee for the Great Lakes region. I have memories when the food scene started taking off in Detroit. And it was really one of the leaders in that. And it's still excellent to this day. She Wolf is an Italian restaurant. They make all their pasta in house, more of like a modern Italian. It's very good. It's a very sharp, true kitchen and cocktails is a farm to table spot. It's right next to the DIA and it has a really nice patio that overlooks the Detroit Institute of Arts. And then also Oak and Reel is another modern Italian restaurant that's really excellent in this area as well. So like I said, this area has a lot of really good restaurants and a really great food scene. Excellent. Alright. So day three, day two, like I said, that's like the more of the Midtown, the northern side of the Detroit area.

23:56Now we're going to go west over to the Cork Town area of Detroit to start off. So Cork Town is right next to Mexican Town. And I would recommend starting off just south of Mexican Town having coffee and breakfast at the Grand Porter. It's a new coffee shop breakfast place that actually just opened just a little bit ago. Very good, highly recommend it. And after you've had a great breakfast and good coffee, you're going to head over to the Michigan Central Station. And I really love the story of Michigan Central Station because of the irony of it. So... This was a big and wasn't it? It was, yeah. I think last time we did an episode, this was still abandoned. It was, yeah. It was in 2018 Ford Motor Company bought it and did almost a $1 billion renovation of the Michigan Central Station. And it's really ironic because when the Michigan Central Station was built, it was built to welcome in the rise of the automotive industry in Detroit.

25:04And then it was the automotive industry that eventually led to the decline of passenger railroads. Right. And so then it was shut down abandoned. It became like the symbol of abandonment in Detroit. When I first moved here, all of the windows were smashed in. There was graffiti all over the building. And like I said, in 2018 Ford purchased it, renovated it. And now you can go and see it is really cool inside. You can take tours, I haven't gone on a tour, but if you just go there, you can also see some placards that they have up up of the renovations that they did. They kept some of the graffiti inside and renovated the graffiti, which is really cool. Interesting. Yeah, it's just a really cool place to go and stop and visit. And it's a huge building. Built as a train station originally, but with must have been office buildings above it or something. Yeah, I don't know what it was used for when it was originally built.

26:06Now it is office building. So some of Ford Motor Company is housed there and they also are bringing in transportation companies to work there as well. Okay. So after you're done with the Michigan Central Station, also in this area is a brand new park that was also open this year. I'm a mother of a two year old, so I know I'm always scouring the best parks, but I understand. But this one is awesome. I don't think I've ever been to a park anywhere else. I hear there's one similar to this in Chicago, but I haven't been to a park like this really ever. Since this one opened up in Detroit, I think that it's good. Even if you don't have kids, you just go there and see it, but they have huge play structures and slides like a giant bear. All kinds of different animals butterflies. Oh, sorry. It's the Ralph C Wilson Centennial Park. You're right. I missed the name. It's on the Detroit Riverfront.

27:07There was a big restoration project that happened to create this park. You can see the embassar bridge from the park. Just a really cool place to go and walk around and experience what's happening there in this area. All right. For the afternoon, I would say that you can choose one of two things. If you are here after spring, summer of 2027, I would highly recommend going and studying the afternoon. And then the Motown Museum. Unfortunately, right now, the Motown Museum is closed for renovation. You can still go there and you can still get your picture out front with its full USA. But there's a lot of construction going on and you can't do the tour through the recording studio. The website said that their reopening in spring, 2027, but I would say anytime spring, summer, I would verify that it's actually open.

28:08Before you come, if that is something that you really want to see. This looks like it was just a residential house where they opened up a recording studio. It is. Yeah. It's really cool. I went there before they had closed it for renovations and you can go and see the actual recording studio. You can see scuff marks in the floor from people dancing. It's just a really good experience. I don't know exactly what it's going to be like after they get done with all those renovations, but highly recommend going and hearing about the history of Motown there. As an alternative, if you're here when the Motown Museum is still closed or if diving into the automotive industry is more of your interest, you can head on over to Dearborn, Michigan, which is where for it is headquartered. I mentioned earlier, there's a lot of really great Mediterranean food in this area, but you can also visit the Henry Ford Museum, Greenfield Village, which they have a number of different historic buildings that you can walk around and you can ride a Model T.

29:16That would be awesome. Yeah. And then you can also go on the Rouge Factory tour. This one's near and dear to my heart because I started my career working on an automotive assembly line so you can go you can tour an automotive assembly line. They take you over to the Ford Rouge Factory and you get to see how a modern assembly line looks today. And what are they making on the Rouge assembly line? The Ford F-150. I have toured that. It is a great tour. But I'm a huge fan of I've toured at least three auto assembly lines and if you haven't done one and if you're in any way, a nerd like me, you absolutely have to. Yeah, it's a really cool experience. You were saying that this was a great place for ethnic food. Did you have any restaurants in the Dearborn area you wanted to recommend? But one of my favorites is Bob is Grill. All right. But you really can't go wrong. There's all kinds of great Mediterranean restaurants in Dearborn.

30:18Cool. Also really around Metroid at Tray as a whole. All right. Yeah. So if you make your way back to Cork Town, a couple of restaurant recommendations in the Cork Town area is Barta, Barta's, and Argentinian inspired restaurant. And to Coy, one of my favorites is to Coy. It's a modern Thai restaurant. Highly recommended. It's great. Really cool atmosphere too. Got it. All right. So day four on this day, I have us going into the Detroit suburbs. So you're leaving downtown Detroit and going into what's known as Metro Detroit. What I would suggest is getting in your car and even if you're not there for the Woodward Dream Cruise, you can still cruise up Woodward. And that's going to take you out of the city and into the suburbs. And so I think this is just a cool experience. Whenever anybody comes to visit me in Detroit that hasn't been here, I always have them go on this ride with me.

31:19So you get to see exiting downtown Detroit and kind of all of the revitalization that's happening. You then as you exit the Cor downtown between the Cor downtown and the suburbs, you do see some of the area of Detroit that still has abandoned buildings, things that haven't necessarily been gentrified at this time. And then you come out past eight mile, eight mile, like I said, is the exiting point of downtown Detroit to the suburbs and you come to Ferndale. And that's where I would suggest as your first stop is Ferndale, Michigan. It's a really fun eclectic neighborhood. They have a really great bakery there called the Red Hook Bakery Coffee Shop. Great breakfast at the fly trap. You could stop at one of those places and grab your breakfast. Yeah, and they have a fly theme at the fly trap. There's a lot of it would be flies like in fishing, but you. Yeah, flies is in the insect fly. Yeah, they have all kinds of fly artwork on the wall and super fun.

32:25Okay. Ferndale is also an artisan market called the Rust Belt Market, which is fun to stroll through, has some local artisans there. Then you hop back in your car and continue up more into the suburbs. You'll go through Royal Oak. The zoo is there, the Detroit Zoo. So if you're with kids, that's a great place to stop. They recently opened up a large section of the zoo, specifically aimed toward toddlers, which I have a toddler. So it's easier to me and it's a great place to go with kids. I highly recommend the zoo. You could skip it if you don't necessarily have kids. Then you'll exit Royal Oak and continue up north on Woodward Avenue to Birmingham. The try to target getting to Birmingham around lunchtime. As you continue going north is where you'll start to see more and more of an upscale feel to the neighborhoods.

33:26And so when you get into Birmingham is when you'll start to feel that this is more of like an upscale neighborhood and some of the wealth that's come to Detroit from the automotive industry. So this drive gives you the sense of all of those different characteristics of the neighborhood. Birmingham has a really nice walkable downtown. There's lots of good shopping. Common wealth is a good place to stop for lunch there. I recommend getting now walking around exploring the downtown and then getting back in your car and having one more stop before you head back into Detroit. And this would be the Cranbrook House and Gardens. So this is located just a little bit north of Birmingham and Bloomfield Hills. And it was started by George Booth and his wife Ellen and they were known for growing the Detroit News Media Empire. So that's how they got their wealth. And so you can tour their historic home there. But what I really recommend going here for is the gardens. They have wonderful locking paths and gardens that you can explore here.

34:39And they also have an art museum. I haven't been to the art museums. I can't really recommend it, but I've been to the science museum. That also is a nice place to go if you have kids. But like I said, really the thing here is the gardens and just getting a sense of nature being able to see the historic home and gardens is a really nice way to spend the afternoon. So that will conclude your tour of the Detroit suburbs. And we can move on to day five. We should say that the Cranbrook Institute of Science, the Science Museum you were talking about is known for Elmer the Mastodon. Oh, really? So if you haven't seen a mastodon before, that's apparently one place you can find one. Nice. So day five. Yeah, day five. So day five, I would time it with a Saturday. So you would move this around to whatever day you're there on a Saturday because this is our Eastern market day.

35:45So Eastern market is the main farmers market in Detroit. And it is huge. I know it's hard to comprehend what a shed is, but they have seven of these very large historic sheds that are just full of different food vendors. It's a great place to just go and experience what the Detroit market scene is like. It's been a market since the 1800s. And also in this area is where there's a large number of the art murals that I referred to earlier. So you can also do a tour and drive around and look at the various art murals around this area of Detroit as well. And it's like, if I picture the largest farmers market, I've been to that's going to be one shed worth of this market. Yeah, it is very large.

36:46Also in this area, another Detroit brand is Germack. They have a store here that's a nut company, but you can also stop at the Germack store, get some Detroit nuts. And also there's a cute coffee shop there as well. It's a fun place to stop in. So I would recommend going to the Eastern market in the morning. And then in the afternoon, I would pair it with a bike tour. Wheelhouse Detroit is located at the Detroit River front. So that that same place that I mentioned on day one, they have all kinds of different tours. So one I've been on is the architecture bike tour and it was excellent. They take you to the Guardian building, which is a really cool art deco building in downtown Detroit. And all of kind of the key architecture sites around the city, you also get to drive up the quinter cut, which is a bike path that runs north to south throughout the city.

37:46And they did take us to a couple of the Eastern market murals on that tour as well. So you can check out wheelhouse Detroit. They have a number of other tours, but the architecture tour was really great. Okay, cool. So that's the end of day five. And for the rest of the week with day six or seven, I thought that I would just give a couple of options for day trips from the city. So the first one on my list for day trips is going to Ann Arbor. So Ann Arbor is about 45 minutes from Detroit. It's home to the University of Michigan. And they have a really nice downtown, very walkable. You can explore the university, lots of good restaurants and shopping. They also have a really cool canoe delivery. So you can rent canoes, go down the river. You can also do intertutes.

38:49So the river running right through the middle of the city I'm gathering. It doesn't run through the city. It's on the outskirts of the city. It's very much nature feeling. So you can't physically see the city from it. So if you want to do canoe kayaking, that's a really fun place to go to care with the Ann Arbor city itself. In Ann Arbor, there's also a famous delicatessen called Zingermans. So you can go to Zingermans. They have a bunch of all kinds of different food products that you can try and enjoy. But they're mainly known for a lot of their Jewish delicatessen items on the menu like their Ruben is really good. Okay. So that is Ann Arbor. That's one option for a day trip. Another option is going on the east side of the city of Detroit to the St. Clair Shores area. So you can start your day off at the Henry Ford House. So you can actually see the historic Henry Ford home. See the grounds.

39:55It's on a really nice lake. It's a really beautiful place to walk around. But you can also tour the home and learn about the Henry Ford family as well. And this is the Fairlane estate. I don't know if it's called the Fairlane estate. It's the Henry Ford House. I'm not sure if they have more than one as well. It's near Gross Point. The Edsel and Eleanor Ford House. Yeah, so that's just south of St. Clair Shores. Technically, I guess it says it's in Gross Point. Sure. Yeah, so lots of really great gardens. It's also a nice place to go at Christmas time because they have all the Christmas trees and all the decorations. And they usually have a really nice outdoor lighting area that you can walk through. But you can start there. And then if you are here, this is more of a summer activity. But then you can make your way up to the St. Clair Shores metro park.

40:56And there is a really nice walking path there along the beach and the pier. And then there's a small beach there, a playground. It's just a really nice metro park to spend the afternoon and look over the lake. St. Clair runs into Lake Huron on one end and then the Detroit River on the other. So that is option two for day trips. Before you get to up in three, you mentioned if I'm there in the summer, when do you recommend we come? You can really come to Detroit any time of the year, except I probably wouldn't come in January February or March. Okay, just because of the weather. Yeah, it's bitterly cold. A lot of things just really aren't as alive. Detroiters like to hibernate a little bit in the winter time. So I would say yeah, anytime between April and December. It's a good time to come to the city.

41:57Okay. Yeah, option three for day trips would be going to the village of Frankenmuth. This is a little bit touristy, but it is a German village with a really cute downtown. I like it a little bit more in the summertime just because there's lots of flowers blooming and it has a really nice atmosphere in the summertime. But you can go all year round. They're known for their chicken dinners so you can go and experience the Frankenmuth chicken dinners. There's also the world's largest Christmas store there called Bronners. So it's just a nice place to go for a day outing. Like I said, it's a little bit touristy, but I like it. It's a fun time. Okay. Yeah, and then last on my list, this isn't necessarily a full day trip, but I feel like it needs a shout out is Bell Isle. So this is an island not very far from downtown Detroit on the Detroit River.

42:57There is a lot to do on the island. You can walk around the outside of the island. There's a small aquarium. There's a conservatory there. And it just has a lot of really nice views of the Detroit skyline. You can see Windsor. So well, it's not necessarily a full day. It is a nice little getaway from the city as well. Cool. It seems like you are wrapping up your itinerary here. Yep. So that is the end of my itinerary. Okay. Before we get to some of our wrap up questions, what else do we need to know before we go to Detroit? Oh, I forgot to mention the two iconic Detroit foods. So Detroit is also known for their conies. I'm not a big pony fan, but if you are, you need to go downtown and you can try American, and then you can go and get your own pony and national pony.

43:57They are right next to each other and decide which one you like better. And when you say, we are talking about a hot dog. Correct. A hot dog with pizza sauce on the top. It is like a ground beef chili. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, it is your hot dog with the chili on the top. And you can try your pony from the two rivalry pony places. And the other is that the Detroit style pizza, which is like a square, deep dish pizza. One of, if not my favorite pizza in the US. Really? Yeah. Yeah, and you get kind of like crispy cheese on the outside edges. It's really good. And you're skipping over that they make it in a black pan that was originally an oil pan from a car. Is where it comes from. And then you line that with cheese and then put your pizza in, which is why you have the crusty cheese on the outside.

45:01I only recently discovered Detroit style pizza here in California and Emma fan. Yeah, yeah, it is really good. I would say. Buddy is the well known local chain in the area. I really like it. It's good. There's a place near me outside of the city in Royal Oak called Palazzo de pizza, which is my favorite. But it's a good thing to try when you're in the city as well. Excellent. Anything else we need to know about going to Detroit? I think I covered most of the highlights. And glad we didn't miss the Coney dogs and the pizza there. As we get to our wrap up questions, you're standing in the prettiest spot in Detroit. Where are you standing and what are you looking at? Yeah, I would say down at the Detroit River walk at sunset. Okay. Looking at the sun, go down over the investor bridge and the Detroit skyline. Excellent.

46:01And one thing that makes you laugh and say only in Detroit. I think only in Detroit, you can see the story of Michigan Central Station where you have this irony of. There was this train station that was built to bring in the auto industry, the auto industry then caused the decline of the railroad industry. And then now it has been purchased by an auto maker and revitalized it. I don't know if it makes me laugh, but it's definitely only in Detroit that you see things like that. And if you had to summarize Detroit in just three words, what three words, would you use? I think I would use resilient. Yeah. Delicious layered. Excellent. Our guest again has been Cassandra Sugarman and Cassandra doesn't have a blog so we won't go say you after her blog, but Cassandra, thanks so much for coming on amateur traveler and sharing with us your obvious love for your adopted home of Detroit.

47:08Yeah, thank you so much, Chris. Thanks for all you do. Thanks again to Cassandra and a special thanks to the patrons of the show who help support amateur traveler financially if you're interested in learning more about becoming a patron of the show, go to patreon.com slash amateur traveler. If you're interested in traveling with me in Bolivia in May of 2027, either just drop me an email for details or go to amateur traveler.com slash trips. I heard recently from Steve who wrote, hi, Chris, you've been my go to for years and I listen to your podcast whenever I'm planning a trip to a new country. Thanks. I travel to some unusual places and my family and friends think I'm nuts, but your recent post talked about those types of places and tried to dismiss some American stereotypes, which is great. Americans seem to like feeling sorry for many places in the world and sometimes I think it's a way to feel superior.

48:08I remember in Australia and asking me, why are you Americans the only ones who that say have a safe trip? I didn't know we were alone in doing that and just said, guess we don't get how much and are afraid of the rest of the world. Most of the world is very similar to us in 90% of the way, but we just don't know that often I find some of the less developed countries are more advanced than us in many other ways. Greetings in Mali go on forever and are beautiful, for example, despite having traveled to many countries, I'm still amazed how modern some places are. My American bias is persistent, bend to Otis recently amazing anyway, just wanted to say your podcast is great and Americans especially are better when they learn about the rest of the world, you have made that happen best regards Steve. Thanks Steve. Steve was talking about some of the posts that I was doing on social media on Instagram and Tik Tok and the like some of the short form videos that I've been doing and a series of them I was talking about fear of travel and where we would go.

49:11If we weren't afraid, you'll have to check those out on Instagram. I'm Chris to X and with that we're going to end this episode of amateur traveler if you have any questions, send an email to Chris to X at gmail dot com or better yet, leave a comment on this episode at amateur traveler dot com and as always, thanks so much for listening.