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Friday, March 11, 2011
Outoor Recreation in the Ann Arbor Area
There's no shortage of options for outdoor recreation in the Ann Arbor area. Outdoor enthusiasts will be impressed with our wide variety of parks, golf courses, bike trails, and more. When you visit Ann Arbor, you can hike in a State park, have a boating adventure on the Huron River, and hit the links at many impressive and unique courses - and do it all again the next day when you plan an overnight stay.
The City of Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County offer many options for parks and recreation - click here for a complete list. If golf is your game, be sure to check out Leslie Park Golf Course - named one of the country's best municipal golf courses by Golf Digest in 2009. Adventurers will also enjoy kayaking the "Urban Jungle:" start your paddle at Ann Arbor's Argo Park and get ready for a scenic adventure through natural and urban scenery.
For more ideas, check out our Plan a Visit section.
Monday, March 08, 2010
The Ann Arbor Art Fair, July 20-23
The popular Ann Arbor Art Fair will be held in downtown Ann Arbor from July 20-23.
For more than 50 years, artists with amazing talents and unsurpassed skills have come to the streets of Ann Arbor in July to exhibit at the Ann Arbor Art Fairs. The Fairs are an impressive sight to see: no matter what direction you take, no matter where you look, you’ll discover colors and sights that will energize and captivate.
For more information, visit www.artfairs.visitannarbor.org.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Ann Arbor’s Craft Beer Scene
If you think the selection of micro-brews is starting to become bigger than that of macro brews, you're not too far from the truth, especially in Ann Arbor.
The college town is welcoming its sixth craft brewing establishment with the Wolverine State Brewing Co., (opening Spring, 2010), making it the municipality with the most microbrews or brewpubs in Michigan.
"Certainly the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area is a great place for Michigan craft beer," says Scott Graham, executive director of the Michigan Brewers Guild. "I think there is a lot of room for more growth still."
The four people behind Wolverine Brewing are in the process of turning a former appliance store on Stadium Boulevard into a microbrewry. Wolverine will introduce a new concept to the existing microbrewery scene: they'll be brewing only lagers, and will focus on trying to create the best microbrew lager in Michigan.
"We feel like we can complement all of the great ales you can get at Jolly Pumpkin, Ann Arbor Brewing Co and all of the great brewpubs," says E.T. Crowe, a co-owner of Wolverine Brewing.
That sentiment is one of the keys to Ann Arbor's success at foster craft brewing, according to Rene Greff. The co-owner of Ann Arbor's first microbreweryy, Arbor Brewing Co., says clustering businesses like this allows them to grow off each other. Plus, it helps that Ann Arbor's populace has many of the attributes common with microbrewery consumers, such as high levels of education, lots of disposable income and being well-traveled.
"Ann Arbor has the perfect demographics for microbreweries," Greff says.
Writer: Jon Zemke
Take a Beer-Cation! Visit these fine Ann Arbor area brewpubs and microbreweries (don't forget to bring a designated driver):
Ann Arbor:
-Jolly Pumpkin Cafe and Brewery
-Wolverine Brewing Company (opening Spring, 2010)
Ypsilanti:
Milan:
Original Gravity Brewing Company
Or, try them all and more Michigan beers at the
Summer Beer Fest, happening this July at Riverside Park in Ypsilanti.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Visit Original Gravity Brewing Company in Milan
Brad Sancho is a mechanical engineer-turned-brewer who's betting that his little brewery, Original Gravity, will draw home-brew aficionados as well as Joe Six-Packs from near and far.
Housed in a 4,400-square-foot building at 440 County St. in Milan, the business features a network of stainless steel tanks, piping and boilers designed to turn grain, hops, yeast and water into heady palate-pleasers.
Despite a struggling economy, high prices for grains and hops, and fierce competition among behemoth brewers, Mr. Sancho, 33, hopes to tap part of a craft beer market that generated $5.7 billion last year - a year in which the microbrewery segment grew by 21 percent.
Just inside the Monroe County line, his little business will be able to brew about 217 barrels a year, or about 7,000 gallons of whatever kind of beer he or his customers fancy.
An Ypsilanti resident and 1993 graduate of Ypsilanti Lincoln High School, Mr. Sancho earned a mechanical engineering degree from the University of Michigan and most recently worked for about nine years for a diesel emissions technology center. About six years ago, his brother-in-law proposed they try to make a home brew. "I like beer, but I never thought about making it," Mr. Sancho said.
He started with beer-making kits and brewing on the kitchen stove. That evolved into a 10-gallon propane fueled system, which now stands among the much larger shiny tanks of his new microbrewery as both a reminder of his beginnings and a means for experimental and small-batch brewing.
As he developed more of a taste for brewing, he found his regular job less fulfilling.
"I didn't use any of my skills. It was mundane and monotonous and kind of robotic," he says. "There was no real creativity involved."
He researched the microbrewery concept, developed a business plan, found a willing lender and chose Milan to settle in because it's centrally located to other areas, such as Ann Arbor, Saline, Dundee and Monroe.
To read the rest of this article, click here.