August 05, 2003
Visiting Ann Arbor.
We've spent the afternoon touring the Ann Arbor area. Rob ought to be getting paid by the Chamber of Commerce. It's pretty nice. A little background...
About a year ago Rob and Sarah announced that they were leaving Silicon Valley and moving to Ann Arbor. They had no jobs here and not really any family.
They had spent some months visiting and evaluating many communities around the country, and this is the one that won.
After the initial shock, I did a little research and discovered that A2, as they call it, is not the where's-that-backwater that I thought. Most notable is that this is where the characters from "The Big Chill" originally met as students at U Michigan.
Anyway, even though I had seen some plusses to the area I was still a little dubious even when I arrived yesterday.
But Rob's tour has really impressed me. The downtown is lots of older building, nicely renovated with many interesting shops and restaurants.
We had lunch at what is apparently a very popular deli called Zingermanns.
Late we drove along the Huron River which passes through town. We headed to the NW upriver along a river road that was quite picturesque. We ended up at a park with picnic area, hiking/biking/running trails. And we played frisbee golf, which is apprently quite popular here.
Then we went out to visit their new house that is being built. Nice, big.
Obligatory Aviation thing. Near there new home is the Ann Arbor Airport (ARB). It is the home of EAA Chapter 333.
Any way, A2 seems like a real nice place. Hopefully they'll let me visit again sometime.
Posted by jghiii at August 5, 2003 06:31 PMWhy "A2" ?
These photos look so much Like Montpelier its almost spookie (not our sister).
I should shoot some photos of three spots in down town Montpelier and send them to you. You could post them next to these, it would look cool.
Dave
Is A2 for the double A in Ann Arbor.
Funny you should mention Montpelier...a great town and it was in the running but nixed since there weren't enough high tech jobs nearby. A2 (actually, A-squared) doesn't have the rugged beauty of VT but turned out to be way more practical for us.
Some more details on our search are on our website (click my name below)
The " apparently a very popular deli called Zingermanns" is consistanly ranked as one of the top 3 delis in the US every year.
It was very good. I've found myself thinking about it, off and on, in the months since my visit.