Season 4 starts January 23rd, 2025

Dubuque, Iowa was and is, first and foremost, a river town. The mighty Mississippi is worked, revered and enjoyed here by locals and visitors alike.

Marquette in Michigan’s U.P. is for everyone! Incredible views, adventure, White fish, Theater. And if you still don’t get the picture, you can get that too!

As the name proclaims…The Harbor District begins at the mouth of the Lake Michigan Harbor and stretches southdown the river.

The Harbor District surrounds Milwaukee’s Inner Harbor–the place where our three rivers come together –The Milwaukee, Menomonee and Kinnickinnic River all flow into the harbor of Milwaukee at Lake Michigan.

Bloomington Minnesota is home to the Mall of America, and the behind-the-scenes tour was full of surprises for John McGivern.

The rest of the city was also full of surprises. He didn’t expect to find a ski-jump, the largest bicycle products distributor in America, the first tap room in Minnesota and a goat farm!

Goshen is in Elkhart County, IN. This area makes 85% of recreational vehicles in the US. Dynamax, Janus Motorcycles, Goshen College and Radio Horizonte were surprising. Mexican food is a given here, but Neopolitan pizza at Venturi and Maple City Indian Restaurant? Yum! Add the Old Bag Factory and Quilt Gardens and what you get is joy.

Get ready for all things Dutch,and much more. John McGivern clomps around in wooden shoes at Windmill Gardens, satisfies his sweet tooth at Nelis’ Dutch Village and DeBoer Bakery, cherishes his wooden bowl from the Holland Bowl Mill, and is enthralled at the only Delft factory in North America.

Being right on Lake Michigan, South Haven Michigan has always been a port city. In the late 1800’s the surrounding timber industry gave way to farming, but another industry grew very well here–the resort and tourism industry.

Sandy beaches, lovely lake breezes and a charming downtown still make South Haven a popular summer tourist destination. South Haven is in southwestern Michigan, along Intestate 196 at the mouth of the Black River on the shores of Lake Michigan.

De Pere, WI is sometimes called a suburb of Green Bay, but don’t say that to anyone who lives there.

Formed more than 10-thousand years ago by glaciers, the area was first home the Miami and Potawatomi tribes. The area quickly thrived thanks to its location to not just Lake Michigan, but also rivers –helping the fur trade and eventually steel production, flourish. But water wasn’t the only mode of transpiration that brought in commerce. Railroads brought in goods and people.

Today, the Indiana Dunes are a hot spot for visitors in the Midwest and beyond.

n 1900, Kalamazoo was the celery capital of the world! No kidding. The nearby “mucklands” –which must not exist where I live-are perfect for growing celery! Earlier, in the second half of the 1800’s, Kalamazoo was known as paper city. The Bryant Paper Company here in Kalamazoo became largest Michigan manufacturer of book paper. And by World War II, a score of local mills made Kalamazoo the largest paper producer in the nation.

Dodgeville, Wisconsin   Dodgeville, WI, is a close-knit yet welcoming driftless area community built on mining. Dodgeville has some legendary Wisconsin treasures, like Governor Dodge State Park, The House on the Rock and Bob’s Bitchin BBQ. There are legendary...

Chicago’s Lincoln Square neighborhood boasts a main street straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting. John McGivern enjoys the German roots still present, but also finds many ethnicities in this diverse neighborhood.