After you have spent the day traveling and then gotten a good nights rest at one of the luxurious hotels located in Grand Rapids Michigan you may be ready to get out for a walk. There are many places to visit in the city that will be quite interesting and entertaining. There is always the Gerald R Ford Museum which is the final resting place of the former President as well as an interesting view of his presidency. Then there are some Native American burial mounds left by the Hopewll tribe that was preserved by the modern people of the city. Then there is the Van Andel Museum Center which is one of the oldest history museums in the U.S..

If you want a bit of fresh air you may want to spend a day walking around the John Ball Zoological Garden. This land was donated to the city by the estate of John Ball in 1884, who helped develop the city when he settle here in 1837. He was a lawyer, teacher and eventual Governor of areas of Michigan. He was always over seeing the best interest of Grand Rapids. When he died his will left 40 acres to the city for this park. The city took the gift and added another 100 acres and then turned it into a destination fun park. There were ponds, a band stand, playgrounds and ballfields. They put in a theater, trails and then the zoo. The city continued to add to the park until the the Great Depression when the zoo fell to hard times. But the zoo was revived in 1949 by Katherine Whinery’s efforts to talk the mayor into creating a Zoo Society. The zoo today is a magnificent place to spend the day. It is filled with so many animals and displays.

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