day 2 & 3
Hello from the Dearborn truck plant! Today we are visiting the Henry Ford Museum and doing the Rouge Factory Tour. We decided to do the tour first, so we took a shuttle bus over here to the Rouge facility, saw a movie about the history of the Rouge plant and Henry Ford's contributions to modern manufacturing, and then spent an hour looking over the F-150 assembly line. It was so very cool to watch trucks being built! A few workers waved and smiled at us as they installed headliners, moon roofs, seat belts, side mirrors, etc. (Robots take care of the windshields.)
The Beaner and Al are downstairs looking at some of the cars that have been manufactured here over the past 100 years as I write this in a break area just outside the assembly plant. The assembly line shuts down from 12-12:30 for lunch.
Yesterday we had a fairly straightforward drive from Pittsburgh to Detroit, with no notable stops. Downtown Detroit was (perhaps not remarkably for a Sunday in a business district) almost completely deserted when we arrived at our very nice Courtyard hotel directly across the street from GM's headquarters at the Renaissance Center. We have an amazing view of the city from our room on the 20th floor, and it's kind of weird to look at Windsor, Ontario just across the water. (Our hotel is also across the street from the TUNNEL TO CANADA.)
While looking for a place to eat dinner last night, we were passed by no less than three camouflaged test cars -- two that the Beaner identified as Darts, and one that Al identified as an Alfa Romeo.
We were very hungry, and our first choice couldn't accommodate us due to a party of 90 (!) showing up without a reservation, so we ended up choosing a somewhat upscale seafood place in the Renaissance Center, which is connected to our hotel by skywalk. There are GM cars in the lobby, shops, restaurants, and a food court in addition to GM offices in several different towers connected by a central hub. We plan to go back later in the week for a tour of the building.
We're now boarding the shuttle bus back to the Henry Ford Museum, so I'll stop now and pick up here in my next missive. We're having a great time.
Love,
Lori
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