Frankenmuth and Dearborn Michigan

Once we left the Upper Pennisula of Michigan and traveled over the beautiful five mile long bridge and into the rest of Michigan we looked around for things to do or see because we have more than two weeks before we are going to the Mandalay pre rally and then the Thor Diesel Club rally in the Elkhart Indiana area.

We stopped at a Cracker Barrel Restaurant in Bridgeport Michigan (near Saginaw) and parked there for 3 nights, they are very RV friendly and this one was exceptionally nice, the manager there told us about a Oktoberfest going on in a nearby German town named Frankenmuth and said we were welcome to stay in their parking lot as long as we like.  So we drove the car over there the next day.

We were driving through Frankenmuth, just looking around, and we ran across this wonderful military museum.  They only have things for people from Michigan, but it is one of the best we have ever seen, well worth a trip to this area, So if you are ever in the Saginaw Michigan area, don't miss this Michigan Military Museum, it was a big bonus for us.

Then we headed over to Bonner Christmas Wonderland, this is advertised as "World's Largest Christmas Store".  So we figured we had better not miss this stop.

Joe always finds a friend

This was a huge Christmas Store, they say the largest in the world, I believe it too...what a place.  The next morning we had breakfast and then went on down the highway toward Detroit, it was only about three hours away.

We went to another Cracker Barrel in Belleville Michigan near Dearborn.  We checked with the manager when we had dinner, and she said we could spend a couple of nights in their big parking lot. We wanted to visit the Henry Ford Museum the next day, the manager said "stay as long as you like"  they are always so nice to RVers.

We went to the Henry Ford Village in Dearborn Michigan, near Detroit.  We took a tour of the Ford Factory where the Ford F150 is made, it was very interesting.  We spent a couple of hours there watching the workers assembling the trucks. There is a cat walk above the factory all around the building, so you can watch the workers below while they build the F-150 trucks.  

Then we took the shuttle bus over to Ford's Greenfield Village, a replica of a town back in the early 1900's.  Complete with the old cars and trucks and the horse and wagons too, you can ride in any of these too.   There was a train all around the perimeter of the village and a round house.  There were several stores and shops with goods from that period also.  We had a great time there.