Father & Son Trip to the Northeast Part 2

The other part of this trip was spent in Detroit, otherwise known as the "Motor City" and "Motown." Detroit is the largest city in Michigan and the 11th largest in the United States. Detroit sits north of Windsor, Ontario, Canada, making it the only place in the United States where Canada is south of it. With the metro areas of Detroit and Windsor, the population is nearly 6 million people. The two cities are vital to each other countries economies as people cross the border everyday for work.

Detroit is vital to the automotive industry of the United States. Detroit is headquarters for the Big Three automobile companies; General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler. The city also hosts the North American Auto Show every year in January, the largest in the country.

Detroit’s nightlife consists of casinos and clubs mostly situated in Greektown. As the name implies, this vibrant neighborhood boasts some of the best Greek food in the area while giving you that Las Vegas feel.

For the sports enthusiast, take your pick. The legendary Tigers play at Comerica Park and the Lions play at Ford Field, which is also host to the Motor City Bowl in NCAA football. A powerhouse in hockey, the Red Wings play in downtown at Joe Louis Arena. The only team that does not play within the city limits of Detroit is the Pistons of the NBA which play in Auburn Hills, a suburb north of the city.

Quick Tips:

Detroit has a very high crime rate. As of 2006, it had the sixth highest number of violent crimes among the twenty-five largest cities. Always exercise caution when going out and try not to go anywhere alone.

With the tightened border controls, if you plan to go to Canada, make sure you have a passport.

Best Way To Get Around:

Detroit is serviced by the Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport, which is a hub for Northwest Airlines and Spirit Airlines. The airport is a major gateway for visitors traveling from Europe and Asia. There is another airport, Coleman A. Young International Airport, on the city's northeast side, but is currently only used for charter airlines.

Detroit is also serviced by three major interstates, I-94, I-96, and I-75. Kings Highway 401 links Detroit with Windsor in Canada and continues up to Toronto. There are two ways to cross the border. The Ambassador Bridge is a major artery for the two cities and is plagued with traffic jams. The Ambassador Bridge carries 27% of the total trade between the two countries, making it the busiest single border crossing in North America. The toll for the bridge is each way. The second busiest border crossing is the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel. The toll rates are .75 each way.

Detroit has a subway system known as the People Mover. It resembles the elevated train in Chicago, but it differs in that it is driverless. There are thirteen stops on the 2.9 mile loop with access to most of the major attractions in Detroit. The fare is only .50 per ride, making it one of the cheapest public transportation systems anywhere. Taxis are another option, but a lot more expensive. Vehicles are not really necessary in downtown but are needed if you plan to visit the suburbs of Detroit.

The Renaissance Center is an impressive set of buildings located in the heart of downtown Detroit overlooking the International Riverfront. The Renaissance Center is seven interconnected skyscrapers which are all owned by General Motors and is also the site of their world headquarters. The central tower houses the Detroit Marriott making it the tallest all-hotel skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere and is the largest building in Detroit.

For anyone who has ever stayed at a Marriott hotel, the name is synonymous with luxury, comfort, quality, and excellent customer service. The hotel consists of seventy-three floors with 1,298 rooms and 27 meeting rooms with a total of 100,000 square feet of space and able to accommodate 2200 people. The rooms are immaculate with many of the amenities that are customary in hotels such as these with a few extras added in. All of the rooms come with wireless high speed internet and 32 inch flat panel TV's. Marriott is my preferred hotel chain and the major reason is the beds. All of Marriott's hotels have plush down comforters and an abundance of pillows, so after a hard day of seeing the sights and eating the food, I am out like a light when I hit the bed. The hotel also offers 52 suites for added luxury, a concierge level, and a 2 tier lounge.

The hotel and surrounding towers offer many dining options for those who prefer not to leave the hotel. The central tower has a sushi bar and Japanese cuisine at Musashi by BarOne and the RiverCafe boasts American comfort foods while offering breathtaking views of Canada and the river. Coach Insignia is a fine dining restaurant located on the top floor of Marriott Renaissance Tower. In the nearby towers, Andiamos serves up Italian food and Seldom Blues is a jazz restaurant. Sweet Lorraine's Cafe and Bar serves American style dishes and was voted one of Michigan's Top Ten Favorite restaurants in the Zagat guide. But if you are like me, I pass on the hotel restaurants and with Greektown just a few blocks away; you guessed it, the best Greek food anywhere.

Enterprise has a car rental facility on site and for those with vehicles the rate is $12 daily for self-parking and $20 for valet. If you plan to stay in downtown, the easiest and cheapest way is the People Mover, Detroit’s subway system. A system resembling Chicago's elevated train, the People Mover is a driverless train. The People Mover runs until midnight Sunday thru Thursday and on Friday and Saturday until 2 am. The People Mover has to be one of the cheapest public transportation systems in the county. Fares are only $.50 per ride, no matter how far you travel. There are thirteen stops on the People Mover with one of those stops at the Renaissance Center on Level 2 of Tower 200. Other stops include the Joe Louis Arena, Cobo Center, Greektown, Bricktown and Grand Circus Park with easy access to Comerica Park and Ford Field.

As of 2007, tours are now offered free of charge four times a day of the towers and an elevator ride to the 72nd floor. On a clear day, the view extends for thirty miles. The Renaissance Center is also located directly next to the Detroit/Windsor Tunnel towering above the city while welcoming guests from the north.

While Greece may be the preferred place to get great Greek food, to most that is impracticable. However, Detroit has Greektown, a mixture of Greek restaurants, clubs, and Las Vegas mixed in. Greektown was originally developed by the Germans in the 1830's as a residential community. Then in the early 1900's, the Germans moved out and the newly arrived Greeks moved in and began opening up retail shops and restaurants. Then over the ensuing decades, Polish, Lebanese, Italians, and Mexicans moved into what residential spaces were left. Then in the late 60's, it was reduced to one block and fearing that the neighborhood was in danger, the Greek community came to revive it. Greektown is now a tourist destination and the Historic District is the Register of Historic Places.

Everything in Greektown is confined to a few blocks with Monroe Street as its center. Some of the buildings on Monroe Street resemble the Parthenon and Pegasus in Greece. Getting there is simple as the People Mover has a stop at the Greektown Casino.

After a great dinner at the Pegasus Tavern, what better way to end the night then at the Greektown Casino. A 75,000 square foot casino which makes up the heart of Greektown offers games, slots, and entertainment all under one roof 24/7. The casino has over eight tables featuring all the favorite card games; Blackjack, Texas Hold'em, Three Card Stud, and many more. You can take a pull on the slots, take your chances on the roulette, or throw the dice on the craps table. The casino also has the area's largest poker room, 21 tables to keep you busy all night long.

I like going to the casinos, but I am not a gambler. However, this particular night, you would not have guessed that I don't gamble. As I was walking around the casino watching others win and others lose, I noticed a card table playing War. I remembered the card game War as a child, but this really could not be a casino game. I had been to Las Vegas before and War was not one of the games I noticed. I walked up to the table and sure enough, it was just like I remembered. I sat down at the table with $20 and three hours later, I left with $100. I don't usually play card games at casinos, but War is the easiest game when it comes to betting. It requires no strategy and you only hope your card beats the dealer.

The River Rouge Plant, or commonly referred to as The Rouge, is Ford's largest automobile factor as well as the largest integrated factory in the world. The Rouge was built in 1928 and is 1.5 miles wide by 1 mile long. The complex includes the Rouge Plant along with 93 other buildings for a total of 16 million square feet of factory floor space. The factory has its own docks on the Rouge River, 100 miles of interior railroad tracks, as well as its own electricty plant and ore processing facility. The Rouge was instrumental in building the Ford Model A, the first vehicle built in the facility. It later went on to produce the Mercury, Thunderbird, and four decades of the Mustang. Today the Rouge produces the Ford F-150 and the Lincoln Mark LT pickup trucks.

Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit, located a few miles south, is the world headquarters for Ford and the hometown of its most famous citizen, Henry Ford. In conjunction with the Henry Ford Museum, visitors are allowed to tour the Rouge plant. The tour departs from the Henry Ford Museum where visitors board a bus that will take them to the plant. Tours are offered Monday thru Saturday from 9:30 to 5:00 with the last tour departing at 3:00. The tours have been known to sell out, so reservations are recommended. Tickets can be bought online or at the museum. If you want to see the production line in action, it is recommended that you go during the week. Non-production times are usually on the weekends, holidays, and the first two weeks in July.

The tour actually consists of five parts. It is about a fifteen minute bus ride from the museum to the Rouge plant. The first stop is Legacy Theater where visitors are treated to a thirteen minute presentation on the history of Ford and the Rouge facility. From there is the Art of Manufacturing Theater which is a multisensory presentation on how vehicles are made. After taking your seats, a mutimedia presentation is shown documenting how vehicles go from a coil of steel to the final product. What is amazing about this presentation is you literally feel like you are there. Depending on where you are in the film, your body will go from hot to cold tempeature changes, the smell of paint, glue, and other products used in the production is pumped into the room, giving you a glimpse of what it is like to be on the production line.

After exiting the video, visitors are taken to the observation deck 80 feet above the visitor's center to view one of Ford's greatest innovations, their living roof. The roof above the Rouge plant is 10.4 acres, but through science and technology, it has been converted into a living garden. The roof's primary function is to collect and filter rainwater which reduces the amount of storm water flowing into the River Rouge. The roof is layered with a sedum which is a drought resistent periennal groundcover. The purpose is to reduce the heat that is given off by paved surfaces, but more importantly is insulates the building reducing their heating and cooling costs by five percent. The roof is expected to last longer than conventional roofs thereby saving millions of dollars.

The major part of the tour is the elevated walkway which looks down on the production floor below. The walkway is a 1/3 of a mile long with interactive displays along the way. Although I went when on a non-production day, it was still amazing to see the different areas and the partially assembled F-150's on the line. As you walked along the walkway, the vehicles went from a chassis to the windshield department, then dash installation, door attachment, and the many other areas that it takes to build a vehicle. The walkway takes you by the paint department and then onto quality control. It is here after the vehicle is assembled, that it is put through a series of tests to see that everything has been assembled correctly as well as put through a major car wash to make sure that the vehicle has no leaks. The vehicle is then taken outside for a road test before loaded onto railroad cars to be shipped around the country. This section of the tour is self-guided and lasts between 30-45 minutes. There is no time limit though and when you are finished just head back to the bus stop for the ride back over to the museum.

The last part of the tour is the Legacy Gallery displaying historic Ford models such as the Mustang, Model T, and numerous others. This is a great place to browse and kill some time while waiting for the bus to arrive.

The North American International Auto Show is an auto show held every year in January in Detroit, Michigan. Detroit is the obvious choice since the city is home to the three largest automobile companies in the US; Ford, Chrysler, and General Motors, also known as the "Big Three". The Auto Show was first held in Detroit in 1907 and it has been held there every year except during the years of 1943-1952. Since 1961, the show has been held at the Cobo Center, which has over 1 million square feet of floor space. The show begins with preview days just for the press, then for the auto industry itself, and then a day to raise money for charity, before open up the show to the general public.

As we entered the convention center, it was literally like entering a gentleman's playground. Every car manufacturer from Detroit to Seoul was here, showing off all the new models as well the unique and sometimes crazy designs of the concept cars. While some of these concept cars may one day make it to the streets in perhaps another form, but some are destroyed while others go to museums. One unique concept car that was never used but was operational was Ford's 1954 "Lincoln Futura." The vehicle never went into production, but it did have a unique career as the Batmobile in the Batman series during the 60's. The Buick Y-Job has been considered the first concept car which was developed in the 1930's. While it is nice to browse the new models for the upcoming year, the concept cars take the prize.

Literally all of the manufacturers are present, the Big Three, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Kia; as well as popular but expensive companies such as Lamborghini, Ferrari, Aston Martin, and a few that may not be widely known such as Maybach. Differences exist at the show in terms of how many vehicles are on display and whether or not the vehicles are open to the public to sit in and get a "test drive" so to speak. Aston Martin could only be viewed from behind the ropes while it rotated on stage.

While it will take you all day and possibly two, to see all of the vehicles on display, we quickly glanced at the new models and focused all of our time on the concept vehicles for 2006. The first concept vehicle was Ford's F-250 Super Chief. It is a massive truck, bigger than any Ford has to date, and it has the world's first Tri-Flex fuel engine. The engine uses gasoline, ethanol, and hydrogen which allow the vehicle to travel nearly 500 miles between fill-ups. My only question is that while many more ethanol stations are popping up around the country, where is the nearest hydrogen pump?

Toyota attempted to bring back the minivan in the form of their F3R. For a long time, the minivan was considered the vehicle for soccer moms and Toyota attempted to change that image. The F3R was designed with a stylish look and a neon interior. The interior is what sets this vehicle apart from other minivans. The F3R has third row seating, and while that is not new, the stadium seating design is and it allows passengers to feel much more comfortable.

The award for the best concept car was the Dodge Challenger. The model itself is not new, which first hit production in 1970 and lasted until 1974. The vehicle was revived in 1978 until it was discontinued in 1983. The vehicle was reborn in the modern design just as Ford did with the Mustang and Thunderbird. The vehicle has gone from concept to production with the first cars being offered in 2008.

The Challenger is not the only concept car from 2006 to make it to the streets. The Buick Enclave is a luxury crossover SUV that replaced the Rendezvous, Rainier, and the Terraza minivan and is scheduled to be released in 2008. The Jeep Patriot was a short lived concept car in 2006 when it was put into production the very next year. The Volvo C30 went from unveiling at the beginning of 2006 at the Paris Auto Show to production six months later. So although concept cars can be wildly designed and the practicalities can be hard to see, many vehicles do make it to production.

From BMW to Nissan to Lamborghini, it was truly a man's paradise. There were vehicles that I could afford and many that I could not. One car manufacture that I was not familiar with, but far surpasses most other manufactures is Maybach. Maybach's main competitor is Rolls-Royce and the price tag clearly shows it. In 2006, Maybach had only one vehicle on display, the Maybach 62, and the crowd gathered around it makes you wonder what was so special about it. This vehicle come equipped with fully-reclining rear seat, 4 zone climate control, folding rear tables, BOSE surround sound system, and a refrigerator. Let's not forget the Cockpit Management and Navigation System (COMAND) which come with DVD navigation, CD changers in the rear seats, DVD players and TV's in the front and back, two rear LCD TV's with remote and automatic closing doors. If that is not enough, you can get some extras such as panoramic sunroof, external communication system, as well as many others. I almost laughed when I read the last part of the specifications. The vehicle comes with an umbrella and four champagne flutes, which you will need after the seeing the price tag. The high end model with all options and taxes comes to $690,000, but if that is out of your price range, then the Maybach 57is only $465,000. It is no wonder that they only brought one vehicle to the auto show.