Dow Gardens Holiday Walk

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Growing up in the small-ish town of Midland, MI, there are a number of places that you grow quite familiar with. Among them are the Center for the Arts which I have written about a number of times now and its next door neighbor Dow Gardens.

If the name Dow sounds familiar to you, I am not surprised. The Dow Chemical and Dow Corning corporations basically put the town of Midland on the map. Herbert Henry Dow founded Dow Chemical Company and eventually purchased the Midland Chemical Company and moved his family to the town of Midland. His process for extracting bromine made his company very successful.

I actually grew up right around the corner from an old brine well derrick that was owned by the Dow Chemical Company.

The area where he built his first house has been turned into a garden area that the public can visit and walk around. The garden grounds are also home to the Alden B Dow home and studio. Alden B Dow had a brief apprenticeship under Frank Lloyd Wright.

Now that I have the background done, let's get to the real reason for this post. It's my contribution to the #wednesdaywalk project started by @tattoodjay. My wife had noticed on Facebook they were doing a Holiday Walk, and she expressed an interest in wanting to go.

We tried to wait until there was a bit of snow on the ground and it just so happened that there was this past weekend, so Friday night we made the drive over to visit.

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Typically you have to pay to get into the gardens, but on this occasion they were allowing people to enter and enjoy the walk for free. Which is honestly a good thing. @mrsbozz and I felt a little underwhelmed by the number of lights and we agreed we likely would have been disappointed if we had paid for the experience.

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Although there wasn't an abundance of Christmas lights, you could tell they put a large amount of effort into the walk. These little lanterns were abundant on each side of the path and they guided our way as we strolled through the grounds amidst a light snow. What I found really impressive was the fact that each of the lanterns had real candles in them.

I think the little lanterns were my wife's favorite part of the walk.

The path above leads next to one of the small waterfalls that are on the grounds. It is a very popular spot for people to stop and appreciate nature.

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Like I said, there were a number of Christmas lights, but they were fewer and far between than we expected. I am guessing the power just wasn't readily available for them to go all out through the whole garden.

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It was still pretty either way!

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I am actually a bit surprised at how well my phone camera did in the low light. We arrived at the gardens around dusk and we were fighting a losing battle with daylight by the time we finished. Which was okay with us. The walk probably would have been really lame had it been daytime.

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This is one of two (I think) red bridges that are on the property. They are pretty famous. Many promotional materials for the gardens and the city of Midland for that matter have prominently showcased these bridges over the years.

I can remember as a child running back and forth across these bridges countless times.

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This is what is referred to as the "Pines Home". It is the first and only home that Herbert Henry Dow built in Midland. They had a seating area on the porch where people were sitting and chatting. I think they also had the inside open, but @mrsbozz and I weren't interested in cramming ourselves into a tight space with strangers.

It actually wasn't as busy as I thought it would be for a Friday night this close to Christmas, but there was still a steady flow of traffic that made it hard to get some nice photos at times. There were also a number of enthusiast photographers with all of their excessive gear roaming around taking photos.

As you can see, people kind of ruined the mood of this area by traipsing across the grass to take photos of their kids next to the lighted trees. Dang kids need to stay off the lawn! :)

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This is just a maintenance barn that they had lit up. @mrsbozz and I actually got some of our engagement photos taken near this barn. She mentioned that they were supposed to have a refreshment station and Christmas Carolers roaming through the gardens. I think they were stationed out of this barn.

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On the back part of the walk we were finally able to break free from some of the crowd and just enjoy a nice casual stroll looking at the snow on the ground and the lights. There is an area called the "conservatory" where they had a bunch of Christmas trees set up. Many people were diverting to walk through that area. We thought about it, but when we saw that none of the trees were lit up we decided against it.

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You can see the conservatory just to the left in this photo. Also in this photo is one of the other famous red bridges.

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Apparently the front facing (selfie) camera on my phone doesn't do too well in low light conditions... It was good enough to throw on Facebook though.

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Eventually, we were in the home stretch. I stepped off the path here to take a photo of these four trees. I was trying to get the reflection of the trees on the water, but most of my photos turned out blurry. There was a little rippling stream that runs along the side of the path, but it was too dark to get any good shots of it.

The sound it made was very peaceful and amazing. On a less busy day, it would have been a great place to just sit and reflect on things.

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As we got closer to the main building there were more lit up trees. Like I said, I am guessing there are only limited power outlets throughout the gardens, so it might be difficult for them to light everything up the way we expected.

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This was the last area right before you got back to the main entrance. You can see the building just ahead. They cleverly direct you through the giftshop as you reenter the building. They also have a small snack area where you can order warm cider and stuff like that.

There was a small Christmas themed building right before the main building set up for photo opportunities. I had wanted to get a picture of it, but there was a lady with her three kids trying to take a picture. She was screaming at them and being all-together unpleasant, so my wife and I figured we should just move along before we had to report her to the police or something.

As we left the building, we noticed in the parking lot that Travelin Tom's had their truck parked and were serving visitors. Since my wife had just rented this trucks services to show appreciation to the staff in her building at work we decided to support them. We both got a spiced chai and headed to our warm car for the short drive home.

Even though it didn't live up to our expectations, it was still a really awesome evening. It was nice to spend some time with @mrsbozz outside the house and taking a moment to slow down in this time of year that can be so hectic and crazy.

If you get the chance, I recommend visiting this place. Especially since it was free. If you had to pay, it probably wouldn't have been worth it for this event. I wills say that paying to visit the grounds in the summer is definitely worth it. Knowing how much @ericvancewalton enjoys Frank Lloyd Wright, I think he would get a kick out of this place if he ever visited.

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Sports Talk Social - @bozz.sports

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All pictures/screenshots taken by myself or @mrsbozz unless otherwise sourced