Great Lakes (East) Holidays & Accommodation
USA, North America
The three eastern Great Lake States of Michigan, Indiana and Ohio are kitty corner to each other in the north-central region of the country. They are part of the Mid-West and are known for outdoor pursuits. You can visit picturesque light houses along the shoreline, charter a fishing trip on a Great Lake, or go hiking in a state park if you like, or you can explore numerous historical landmarks. There are also plenty of cities to see. You can visit the roots of the Motown sound in Detroit, visit the Basketball Hall of Fame in New Castle, Indiana, or visit the Rock and Roll Museum in Cleveland, Ohio. There are plenty of historical landmarks and points of interest to keep travellers occupied in this trio of states.
Eastern Great Lakes Holidays Planner
There are numerous cities to visit in this highly urbanised region of America. In Michigan, Detroit is known for its entertainment, museums, and the entertainment of the Motown sound, while Ann Arbor is primarily a university town known for fine dining and cultural pursuits and Kalamazoo is known for the Art Deco architecture of its downtown, its festivals, and its small town feel. Indianapolis, Indiana is known most famously for its motor speedway and its associated Hall of Fame Museum, but is also known for its Museum of Art, and Fort Wayne Indiana is known for its children's zoo, Hyde Brother's Bookseller's, and being the location of the first American professional baseball game in 1871.
In Indiana, you can explore the Indiana Dunes State Park on southern Lake Michigan, this area has a diverse ecosystem of bog, wetlands, woodland forests, homestead, and of course, dunes and beaches to hike and explore. In Michigan, you may want to take a dinner cruise through the engineering marvel of the Soo Locks between Lake Superior and the lower Great Lakes; in addition, Michigan boasts over 11,000 inland lakes to explore.
Ohio boasts spectacular cave formations in West Liberty with beautiful white stalactite and stalagmite formations in a constant underground temperature that makes them a pleasant environment at most times of year to visit.
In Cleveland, one of several large cities in Ohio, visit the Rock and Roll Museum. Ohio was pivotal in the Underground Railroad that saw the smuggling of slaves out of the antebellum South to freedom in the north, and there are landmarks like Haines House in Alliance that memorialize those events. You can also visit historic orchards throughout Ohio and Indiana that were sprouted by seeds scattered by John Chapman a.k.a. Johnny Appleseed.
In Michigan, there are some notable landmarks to visit that include the Kalamazoo Air Zoo, where you can use a full-size flight simulator for a military jet plane, tour the international space station, and see rare and historic aircraft. In Greenfield Village at Dearborn, Michigan you can visit an historic village with a military encampment, see Edison's idea factory, a Main Street neighbourhood, and the courthouse where Abraham Lincoln practiced law. If visiting in August, check out the Indiana State Fair near Indianapolis with rural orientated competitions, rides, and midways.
In August in Indiana, you can visit the state fair near Indianapolis for great food competitions, rides and midway. In Evansville, you can see the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial that commemorates this President's boyhood, while in the George Rogers Clark National Historic Park you can see this memorial that commemorates the capture of this fort from the British during the Revolutionary War in 1779.