Kalamazoo

My birthday celebrations lasted forever this year!  My mom offered up a date for me and Billy, so we took a day trip down to Kalamazoo!

It may not look like much, but breakfast on a train is so much better than anywhere else. = )

After we left the train station, we headed for a museum, and found ourselves in a nice little park.

Back side?

Front side?  There was no plaque.  I have no clue what this was supposed to be.  Is it art? Is it a piece of space shuttle that fell from the sky? A left over piece of industrial equipment?

The museum was free, and very cool!  We spent much longer there than I thought we would.

They had a "miniatures exhibit.  This was placed into the eye of a needle!

My best "biker face."

This was what our ornament read:

There were a few temporary exhibits, one of them was The Mystery of the Mummy!

Next we went to a recommended restaurant for lunch.  It's called the beer exchange because they have a live 'exchange' for their on tap beer prices.  They go up or down depending on what people are ordering.  Sadly, this didn't start until 6pm, so we didn't get to see it in action.

The building they were in was very open, and aesthetically pleasing.

This reminded me of a humorous video that I'd watched.

Since we'd had breakfast not long before, I ordered the fried pickles.  What came out was a bit unexpected.

I acquired a new button from a quarter vending machine.  I have no idea who this is.  Anybody know?

We had some time before our escape room, so we played a round of pool.

On our walk back it was sunny.  Not warm, but above freezing at least.

We stopped in a chocolate shop to see about getting souvenirs for the kids.  I was pretending to eat the UP section of the chocolate Michigan that we bought.

Billy captured the moment I decided to actually eat it. = )

Our newest escape room adventure was Amelia Earhart's lost apartment.  It was pretty awesome.  The story was really good.  They also had some fun games to play in the lobby while you waited (or after your game.)  We escaped and brought our percentage up to a 88!

After we left it was time to go to dinner.

When we arrived at the restaurant we had picked out online, they were closed for a private event until 7, which didn't work with our departing train.  So, we ended up at a place on the other side of the square.  It didn't disappoint at all. = )

It was dark when we were heading back to the train.

We entered through a different door than we had exited in the morning, so we'd missed the display the first time in the train station.

The Kalamazoo train station is really very pretty!

Nice vocabulary on the East Lansing train station door.

It was a quick trip, but so fun.  Of course, any time we take the train I'm excited.

later days

Mt. Pleasant

Last year, my sisters and I planned to do another sister trip, possibly to canada.  When the news came out that this would be the final season for Supernatural, we (or I, if you want to be picky) decided that Vancouver was the new destination.  Since my mom was to take over my children for me for our time there, I was on call to help with any project she might one.  There were lots of small reasons that our trip became impossible.  So, we ended up at Whitefish instead.  It was a good time.

But, since I had stored up all sorts of 'babysitting' time with my mom, Billy and I went to Mt. Pleasant instead.  This post is about that trip. = )

So, Mt. Pleasant is on the radar because of a college co-op senior project that Billy lead last year.  He had made several work trips, and thought I would like the town.

We stayed in a B&B because it was within walking distance to downtown.

An our room had a piano in it!

For dinner we went to Camille's steakhouse.  My expectations were set fairly low (Mt. Pleasant is not a large town.) It did not disappoint!

It shares a building with Mountain Town Staion.

On the second day we had 2 escape rooms planned back to back.  Sadly, this brought our solve rate down to 83%.  (100/50/100)

The first one was Alien, Area 52, themed. I liked the hands on props, much of it was old scientific equipment from a lab!  It was really tricky, but well done. We did solve it, but 10 minutes too late.  We had a few difficulties with some of the props, which took up extra time. So, maybe we could have solved it had we known that the prop was not working properly?  We will never know, but instead of a 0% on that one, I gave us a 50%.  It was still a failure, but we did solve it.

The second one was dinosaur themed.  I liked the set up.  The escape room itself was very techy.  Before we went in the room they had a video of the set up for the room which was pretty neat.  We were also complimented by the attendant that we were the first 2 person group to not request a clue.

There were no concerts while we were there, but we went to check out the nearby casino.  We played with $20, and Billy won a small pot, which meant that we actually only spent $2.50 or something.  It was a fun couple of hours.

A modern cigarette machine!

The resort is on a reservation, and so when you walk through the halls there are lots of displays about the tribe and their history.  I thought this baby contraption looked pretty cozy. = )

They had a Bennigans that was still in operation!  I always get their Monte Cristo and love it every single time. Though, I feel like they shut down just after we moved to Houston, so it's been a long time since we've eaten at Bennigans.

Our B&B was so pretty!

On our way out of town, we tried to go canoeing down the Chippewa River, but the Canoe place wasn't open on a Monday morning.  Weird, right?

We drove to a nearby park to look at the river and find some rocks for the kids (that's what we always bring them as 'souvenirs' on our trips without them.)

We were back in time to pick up my Sam's Club order (since we were travelling on a Monday) and pick up the kids from school! = )

We could probably go back again, have great time, and enjoy a completely different experience! I am definitely a fan of Mt. Pleasant, and have adopted CMU as my Michigan favorite.

later days