IT’S FINALLY HAPPENING. The long awaited, much anticipated Zephyr Bar on Front Street is opening next Wednesday, October 5th.
It’s Marquette’s first wine bar which will also feature plenty of craft beers, desserts, and small dishes–soups, salads, meats, cheeses, and specialties.
There’ll be enough for a dinner if you order a few dishes, but no entrees. The expectation is that most people will come here before dinner for wine and a bite to eat, or after dinner for a drink and dessert.
A nice complement to the other restaurants in town.
A casual, comfortable, sophisticated atmosphere. A huge piece of local artwork dominates the wall behind the bar.
Intensive staff training is now underway.
The hours? 4 pm to 11 pm, Tuesday through Sunday. Closed Monday.
ONE WORD TO describe the newly opened Roam Inn in Munising: class.
But it’s an outdoorsy, Upper Peninsula kind of class. Finely crafted wood and metal work throughout the 18 room hotel, spectacular photographs of the U.P. adorning the walls, a sense of handsomeness and solidity inside and out.
No trophy deerheads hanging on the walls. No mounted rifles either. No Packers or Lions paraphernalia. And no cutesy signs. Not that kind of place.
Their website was launched Friday. Reservations are already coming in for fall and winter. So far, a sprinkling of walk-ins have discovered the place and had to be mightily impressed.
The inn’s restaurant, to be named Tracey’s (after a friend/chef), may open within 45 days. That’s the hope anyway. It’ll be American fare–steaks, chicken, fish, maybe elk–but with premium grade meats, something that owner Tom Dolaskie says won’t be found elsewhere in Munising.
All in all, an auspicious beginning, and a helluvan upgrade for Munising.
EXPECT THE WRITERS from Delta Sky magazine to be descending on Marquette County in the next couple of weeks.
They’ll be preparing stories on us for their December issue. Travel Marquette has been selling ads for the magazine–and they seem expensive until you consider the reach of Delta Sky.
The magazine is read by an estimated five million readers a month. And they’re mostly monied travelers looking for a new place to visit.
How long will the article be? Interesting question. It’ll be determined by how much ad space is sold. You can still get into it by emailing marketing@travelmarquettemichigan.com.
Right now, the article looks like it’ll be several pages long.
Several pages. On little, remote, underpopulated Marquette County. Yikes.
Prepare for a new influx of tourists next year.
MAYBE THIS ISN’T news but it sure as hell is worth noting.
Ten years ago developer Lynn Swadley took a huge chance buying 105 acres in Marquette and announcing the formation of the Harlow Farms Conservation Community.
It’d be single family homes, condos, apartments, a comprehensive senior center…and 30 acres set aside permanently for nature trails.
Great idea. But then the recession and housing collapse hit in 2008-2009. Coulda been disaster.
And yet it wasn’t. Harlow Homes survived, even thrived. Today, it’s home to 165 housing units, with more being built and more to come. A $45 million economic impact so far.
A vastly increased tax base for Marquette.
And 30 pristine acres for us all to enjoy.
Sometimes development, even in the face of adversity, is done exactly right.
SO YOU WERE wondering whether the recently disclosed Wells Fargo scandal affected the U.P?
Turns out, the Wells Fargo corporate folks don’t have a geographical breakdown of the scam. Which means they can’t (or won’t) tell you whether we had problems here.
Quick background: Bank employees all over the nation, under intense pressure to increase business, created bogus bank and credit card accounts for unwitting customers over the last several years.
Employees were fired, fines were paid.
Wells Fargo says they’ve conducted an extensive review of their accounts, and refunded money where they found problems.
But the bottom line for U.P. customers? If you suspect any improprieties, stop by the bank and review your accounts with an executive.
ALL RIGHT, THIS is the last time you’ll read about former WJMN anchor Gabe Caggiano in Word on the Street (we hope).
He’s been sentenced to 41 months in a federal prison.
Background: Caggiano anchored here for about a year after being fired at previous jobs for being troublesome. Threats, harassment, violent outbursts, drug abuse. In fact, he threatened his boss here in Marquette.
But then the real legal trouble began. He was arrested last year for threatening and harassing another former boss in Texas, along with the executive’s wife.
He pleaded guilty to those charges earlier this year, and now he’ll spend the next three and a half years behind bars.
Caggiano, in court, apologized for his behavior and also had this to say: “I’m affectionately called the TV terrorist. Now, I’m called the TV train wreck.”
ON A HAPPIER note, U.P. artists are getting exposure like never before.
51 of them have works on display at ArtPrize in Grand Rapids, 28 of them in a special exhibition space at Devos Place, the most heavily trafficked art venue in the city.
Among the Marquette artists and sculptors: Kathleen Conover, Earl Senchuk, Gordon Gearhart, and Mike Friend.
An estimated 400,000 art-lovers will be visiting Grand Rapids for ArtPrize. It’s a fair guess that at least half of them will be taking a good, long look at the U.P. talent on display.
And they’ll discover we’ve got a lot more than beer, pasties, and snow up here.
You got news? Email briancabell@gmail.com