Our Michigan Week: Lake Views, Museums, and a Quick Hop to Canada

We spent a week camping at Sterling State Park on Lake Erie while Josh had a work conference in Detroit, which meant a few slow days for me, but we still managed to squeeze in some fun. From crossing the border for a quick trip to Windsor, to exploring Belle Isle and the Henry Ford Museum, we made the most of our time in the area. In this post, I’m sharing our full weekly breakdown plus tips for visiting everything we checked out!

Day 1: Driving and Errands on Monday

Our first day in Michigan started with a relatively short drive from our Harvest Host in Ohio to our campground for the week- Sterling State Park, which we have a full campground review of here. We got checked in, set up camp, and then went on an errand run. The reason we were in Michigan was for Josh to go to a two day conference in Detroit. We got groceries, picked up fliers at FedEx, and went to check out the hotel for Josh’s conference and do a little early set-up. 

Day 2: Tuesday Conference & Camp

Tuesday was the first actual day of Josh’s conference, so he was gone all day in the city. I spent the first part of the day doing some computer work, but mostly working on a puzzle. I had planned to spend the two days of his conference doing a puzzle, since I wouldn’t feel bad about taking over the table with him gone, but ended up finishing it the first day because I got really into it. Whoops. 

Josh’s coworker Sara and her family were camping next to us so she could ride with Josh to the conference, so after I finished the puzzle I met up with her husband Elliot and their kids on the beach and then hung out with them in their campsite until Josh and Sara got back. It was fun having campsite neighbors to hang out and to actually sit around a campfire- something we never bother with for just ourselves.

Day 3: Wednesday Repeat

Wednesday was another conference day for Josh and Sara, so I had a similar routine of a little work, a little chores, a little hobby time, and then hanging out with Elliot and the kids until the conference-goers got back.

Day 4: Thursday in Canada, plus Belle Isle

Since our Maryland trip had been so full of work events and then that led right into this conference, Josh took the day off on Thursday. One of the big things we wanted to do while in the area was visit Canada. Our friends who would be visiting on Saturday originally were going to go with, but ended up changing their minds. So it worked out for him to take Thursday off so we could both go. I’ve been to Canada twice, but Josh has only just barely been to Canada when doing a boundary waters canoe trip, which doesn’t really count. I knew at least one way I wanted to take the tunnel, which I had been in before, because it’s such a cool experience. I also read online that it usually had shorter wait times! We ended up just taking it both times, and we could see that the bridge was a lot busier.

Since we only had the day here, we just stayed in Windsor. We started off at the Chimczuk Museum, which is part of the Windsor Community Museum. There are exhibits on both the Indigenous and settler history of Windsor and the local area here. Then we walked over to the Francois Baby house, which is a historic house that was lived in by local politician Francois Baby in the 1700s. The Baby house has exhibits on Francophone heritage in the area, the War of 1812, the Battle of Windsor, and the history of the house itself, which is a National Historic Site of Canada. One thing that was funny to us as Americans is that all the firearms in the museums have trigger locks- even the very old guns that probably don’t work and are super tiny and are in locked cases. 

After the two museums in town, we ventured just outside of town to Ojibway Nature Center. The Nature Center had some nice exhibits, but there was a school field trip visiting, so we just took a quick look. Then we walked one of the trails, which was really nice and even though I didn’t find anything exciting, I can now say I’ve been botanizing in Canada!

Our final Canadian activity was lunch at The Barrel House. Josh got the The Benny burger, with poutine, of course. I tried the Windsor Pizza Burger, and of course we both tried a local Canadian craft beer. Apparently Windsor has its own unique style of pizza, which features shredded pepperoni, canned mushrooms, and a high fat cheese.

After crossing back into the US, we visited one of my Detroit bucket list sites- the Belle Isle Aquarium. Belle Isle is an island state park located in the Detroit River. Besides just park trails, there’s an aquarium, conservatory, nature center, lighthouse, harbor, boat club, and just tons to explore. I’ve seen pictures of the aquarium before and it’s just as amazing in person. Honestly, I barely looked at the fish because I was just in awe of the architecture and the tiles.

After the aquarium, we went right next door to the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory. There are outdoor gardens, as well as the beautiful glass conservatory. The gardens here are super pretty and it’s definitely worth visiting!

We did a quick stop at the William Livingstone Memorial Light, which is a really unique art deco lighthouse. The lighthouse is also known to be the only all marble lighthouse in the country. It was getting rainy again during this, but it was worth it to see such a cool lighthouse.

We finished our visit to Belle Isle at the Belle Isle Nature Center- which was SO cool! They had great animal enclosures and really cool exhibits. It’s definitely high on our list of best nature centers- and we can be picky about our nature centers. 

We have a full guide to Belle Isle up now: Belle Isle Park Guide: What to See, Do & Know Before You Go

Day 5: Friday Wild Ones

Friday I tagged along with Josh to the house of the volunteer board president from his work. We toured her garden, ate bagels, and talked about plants and the organization in general. Then she had us meet another local person who was running a community native seed program. We chatted with him and learned about his project, and then spent the rest of the day back at camp.

Day 6: Saturday with Henry Ford

Saturday was a two-part day for us. The day before we had learned about a large native plant expo at the county fairgrounds on Saturday, so we had to check it out. We’ve never seen anything like it! It was multiple barns full of native plant nurseries, community orgs, and so many people there to buy native plants. It was amazing and definitely worth visiting. We also ran into members of the local Wild Ones chapter and spent time hanging out at their booth. After the expo, we grabbed a quick Tim Horton’s (yay!) and then went off to meet our best friends at the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. They, and our honorary nephew, were doing a small family trip in Indiana and came up for the day to hang out. We spent quite a few hours at the museum since it’s so huge. The museum itself will definitely get its own post on here eventually. After we finally saw everything, they followed us back to our campground. We walked on the beach and waded in the lake, made s’mores, and just caught up. It’s always so fun when people visit us on the road!

Learn everything you need to know to visit the Henry Ford Museum in our post A First-Timer’s Guide to the Henry Ford Museum of Innovation

Day 7: Home on Sunday

Sunday morning we packed up, hit the dump station, and headed back to home base in the Chicago suburbs! We got hit with a crazy storm about 20 minutes from home where we could barely see in front of us, but we made it! We went out to dinner that night with Josh’s dad since a local family-favorite restaurant had finally reopened under new owners after being closed for years. We spent a month at home base catching up on chores, projects, and visiting friends and family. 

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