Muse by David Teitsma

Today, day 3, is my last day in Milwaukee.

My hotel:


Memorial day memoriam:




After sitting in the huge lakeside park and reading for a bit this morning, I went to the Milwaukee Public Museum. Since its labor day, I started to worry that it might not be open, but upon arriving I found out it was! I started at the top and worked my way down. This was a bad idea because I think everyone else did the opposite, and then didn't make it to the top. So the floor was incredibly musty and dusty and dark. Plus there was just so much stuff that it was overwhelming to look at.

The park:


There was an Eastern Island statue on the floor. It was funny as people that passed it all said, "dum dum" which referred to the same style statue in the movie "Night at the Museum" who's sole line was "dum dum" as he wanted a dum dum sucker.

The rest of the museum was sadly unimpressive. Mostly because it was dark and musty as I said earlier. But also the displays seemed out of date and frankly not very interesting, however there was a lot to look at.

However, the planetarium and Imax Dome show that I went to was astounding. First it started with a planetarium show discussing that days sky and what constellations and planets could be seen. This was very interesting, but what really impressed me was that the computer system that they use could map out each night exact sky and then progress through the night and then fly off the Earth, showing that specific nights sky from other places in our solar system.

Also, there was a butterfly room, provided by Northwestern Mutual, that was small, but had many beautiful, colored, intricate, but delicate butterflies. From a distance it was fun having them fly around. But I love getting up close and looking at all the little bones or veins and all the tiny parts that make them up. Sadly, even though there were many signs and an video about not touching or handling the butterflies, that was all everyone else was interested in doing.

I hoped to finish at the museum early enough so I could go walk through the Milwaukee Public Market, but I didn't. Instead, I went and had lunch / dinner at Rock Bottom right on the river downtown. It was beautiful out and I loved sitting on the river watching boats pass by. However, I still felt kind of akward about eating by myself. The food was good, however the service was incredibly slow (it took over twenty minutes to get the bill...)! So I didn't leave a tip, which I felt bad about later. But I had enough food so that I saved half for later on the boat.

So, after walking back to the hotel and picking up my bike and bags from storage I biked down to the Ferry about 7 miles south of town. The ferry was late (it was the end of Memorial day weekend afterall...) but they told everyone immediately and provide snacks and drinks to appease those that were anxious about leaving on time. I was the first person on the boat, so I choose a nice window seat and sat and enjoyed the ride. The ride again was really smooth. I went to the top deck and as we arrived in Muskegon. It was dark and a little chilly, but standing on top make it feel like I was just hovering over the water as we headed into the channel. Then I disembarked and headed home!

It loved the trip, however it ended up being more expensive then I thought it would be ($120 for the ferry service, $250 for the hotel, and $100 for food). I enjoyed the zoo the most. I wish I would have spent more time exploring the bike paths, and I wish I would have gone to the Milwaukee Discovery Center.

Here's the Northwestern Mutual building which looks out at Lake Michigan (its the short dark one on the right):


If you want to do a similar trip, here are the pages I bookmarked in researching my trip

And for the rest of my photos, go to my flickr set here