The year of monthly travels ended in December with a Christmas getaway to Frankenmuth, Michigan.
This has been on my list for a while based off the mixed reviews & since we wanted to keep things a little easy, we decided to travel to Frankenmuth literally Christmas morning. I found a super cute AirBnb in Holly, Michigan. Holly itself had a little alleyway that was all decorated which was perfect for some photos but it’s a small town with not much to do.
Anyways, I booked us Christmas dinner at the famous Zehnder’s of Frankenmuth. It was crazy busy but where we were seated felt like a semi-private experience. To be completely honest (which is how I always am), the food was pretty bland & I felt it was incredibly overpriced. I know people absolutely love it but for me, it was a one & done experience. It was nice to get dressed up & go out on Christmas but the quality wasn’t there. Afterwards, we walked around the main street there to see all the lights but nothing was obviously open since it was Christmas Day. On the way back to our AirBnb, we stopped at Bronner’s which had lights set up all throughout their parking lot for a drive-by experience. This was a nice free thing to do.
The next day we came back to visit all the shops on the main strip. The one surprising thing about Frankenmuth that I didn’t know beforehand was it’s just one short strip of touristy attractions. I had a notion that it was bigger but it’s just like one main street & that’s it. Most shops were tourist traps.ย
We started with Bronner’s which was a major letdown. Pro-tip: go the morning after Christmas. It was completely dead which is the opposite of what you hear about it so we were able to get a good feel of what it actually is: an ornament store. There is not much else besides ornaments. I thought there would be a variety of decor/gifts but it’s 99% ornaments. If you don’t need an ornament, you don’t need to stop here unless you want a photo of the giant Santa outside in the parking lot.
Besides the individual shops, we also stopped at Frankenmuth River Place Shops. There wasn’t many shops that I was too crazy about or would recommend. It’s good to just go & walk around & that’s about it.
After Frankenmuth we were going to head to Canterbury Village, it was apparently all decked out in decorations but they were closed which was a huge disappointment. We still walked around with other confused families to see it all but it was pretty lackluster. Instead, we headed to a mall nearby that also has Peppa Pig World. This was at Great Lakes Crossing Outlets. All we did was walk around here before heading home.ย
Overall, Frankenmuth felt a little overrated for me but I’m glad we did it once to experience it ourselves.ย
Head back to the TRAVEL section for additional trips!
