MOTHER-DAUGHTER MILWAUKEE WEEKEND 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8…Schlemiel! Schlimazel! Hasenpfeffer Incorporated! (Millennials, ask your parents.) I showed Brooke an episode of Laverne and Shirley before we headed out on our mother-daughter Milwaukee weekend. And yes, I made her reenact the opening right out on the street in public. Considering I was taking her to a Miranda Sings concert, it was more than a fair exchange.
Milwaukee is such an easy weekend getaway from our Chicago suburb of Naperville…just under a two hour drive. We hit no traffic and the weather was beautiful, sunny and dry for a mid-March weekend.
If you visit Milwaukee, I can’t imagine you’d want to stay anywhere other than The Pfister Hotel. It’s rich in history, luxury and art. Built in 1893, The Pfister holds the largest hotel collection of Victorian Art in the world. No wonder it is known as “The Jewel of Milwaukee”. The top floor pool with the panoramic view wasn’t lacking either.
Knowing basically nothing about Milwaukee, we were excited to explore the city. Here’s what we learned just by chatting with locals and asking lots of questions:
Milwaukee is a German settlement and the influential Captain Fredrick Pabst’s name is everywhere. He was a German-American brewer who purchased the Pabst Theatre in 1890. Milwaukee is divided by the Milwaukee River. The east sits along the Milwaukee Bay which spills into Lake Michigan. The buildings here are full of character. City Hall could probably be mistaken for Big Ben and the Federal Building looks like a European castle. The west side of Milwaukee seems more suburban and is home to Marquette University–now on Brooke’s college radar. Along the lake is the Museum of Art. Its structure resembles a ship or perhaps a whale. Either way, it’s a work of art in itself!
Although we were surprised not to find any breweries, there’s definitely not a lack of churches in Milwaukee. There almost seems to be a church on every block and the architecture of each one is magnificent. Again the feeling of European teleportation was strong.
To sum up, Milwaukee is perfect for a last minute girl’s getaway, an architectural dream, easy and fun to walk around, rich in history with loads of shopping and dining choices.
ABOUT THE BLOGGERS Naperville mom and teacher, Kristen Kainrath and her teen daughter, Brooke, are a mother-daughter travel-blogging team who have always shared an incurable case of wanderlust. Their goal is to inspire girls to follow their passions and appreciate the diversity of our global community. Follow them on their journeys at www.pedisnpassports.com and watch for their monthly article inside Glancer Magazine in 2018.
