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Posted: 3/15/2024 | March fifteenth, 2024

The next visitor put up is by my mates Adam from the web site Getting Stamped. He and his spouse are very long time residents of Milwaukee and, since I’ve by no means been, I’ve invited him on to share some tips on visiting town.

Milwaukee is underrated, in my view. I like it!

The biggest metropolis in Wisconsin and only one.5 hours north of Chicago, it’s the good measurement: not too small not too huge. It affords tasty meals and drinks, nice sports activities groups, and enjoyable festivals. Plus, it’s inexpensive. And don’t neglect the pleasant locals!

I’ve lived right here my complete life, and my spouse has lived right here for 20 years. We’ve traveled all over the world many instances, and when it got here time to plant roots and begin a household, we might have gone anyplace. However we select to return residence to Milwaukee, which has a lot to supply.

If you wish to know learn how to expertise it like an area, listed here are my insider suggestions:

1. Keep central

I extremely suggest staying downtown or the Third Ward. That is the place a lot of the standard points of interest are positioned. The motels is likely to be barely dearer than elsewhere, however you’ll save on transportation prices since all the pieces is walkable.

These are two motels I really like:

2. Make the most of free rides

Milwaukee doesn’t have a subway system, but it surely does have an incredible free streetcar service known as the Hop, with quite a few stops downtown and across the Third Ward space. Merely hop on and off — no tickets or reservations are wanted! The Hop runs each quarter-hour throughout peak instances and each 20 minutes off-peak and weekends. Click on right here for the map and schedule.

Insider tip: In case you are heading to a sporting occasion, many bars and eating places supply free shuttles to American Household Discipline for Brewer baseball video games and concert events, Summerfest Grounds for festivals and concert events, Fiserv Discussion board for Bucks basketball video games, and different occasions round city.
 

3. Eat like an area

You would possibly suppose Milwaukee’s all beer and cheese (and there’s no scarcity of these), however the meals scene has much more to supply. Milwaukee has its personal (typically quirky) meals traditions and staples, like ButterBurgers and frozen custard.

It additionally has some unimaginable markets, the place you possibly can take pleasure in among the metropolis’s greatest meals from many distributors, multi functional place and in a enjoyable and inexpensive food-hall ambiance. These are two of my favorites:

• third Road Market Corridor – It is a must-visit vacation spot, because it gives a spot for vacationers and locals alike to take pleasure in Milwaukee’s various delicacies. Right here, you will see the aforementioned frozen custard, plus pho, pizza, burgers, artisan sandwiches, tacos, scorching canines, home-cooked meals, ramen, sushi, arepas, and a lot extra — all at inexpensive costs.
• Milwaukee Public Market – Positioned within the historic Third Ward, this superior market is one of the best place to patronize all kinds of distributors with distinctive merchandise, meals choices, and drink pairings. It’s a singular spot to expertise the flavors of Milwaukee’s culinary scene, all beneath one roof, and soak within the native tradition whereas buying or grabbing a chew.

4. Take pleasure in native delicacies

There are a couple of meals that you must attempt that you simply (possibly for good motive) is not going to discover many different locations. They’re distinctive, tasty, and total fairly inexpensive!

• Deep-fried cheese curds – Sure, it’s a factor, and they’re wonderful — get them organized and thank us later. Lakefront Brewery is our high decide.
• Frozen custard – It might appear like ice cream, but it surely’s a lot richer and creamier, with a couple of additional substances. Kopps is one of the best place for it (and nice burgers) — and in addition a kind of locations that, if you happen to don’t go, did you even go to Milwaukee?
• Bratwursts – One other Milwaukee staple. No one does them at a better stage than Vanguard Restaurant within the Bayview neighborhood. It’s best identified for its wonderful house-made sausages, together with vegan choices, with many at an inexpensive value of beneath $10.

On this checklist, we now have solely centered on the Milwaukee favorites, however foodies who wish to delve deeper into the culinary scene may wish to take a look at our full checklist of the greatest eating places in Milwaukee.
 

5. Discover brewing historical past

Whereas microbreweries aren’t precisely a brand new pattern, Milwaukee has been brewing since earlier than it was cool. At one time, it brewed extra beer than any metropolis on the earth. That historical past is obvious throughout city in breweries, eating places, and pubs.

Lakefront Brewery affords in all probability one of the best brewery tour within the metropolis. It’s much more enjoyable than simply shiny tanks and sniffing a pungent jar crammed with hops. The tour guides are hilarious (some are actually comedians from an area membership), and your tour will embody 4 beer samples. That is by far one of the best worth and our private favourite tour — plus, the beer corridor is plenty of enjoyable. The excursions are tremendous standard and promote out on the weekends, so it’s suggested to buy tickets prematurely.

If you wish to hold sampling native beers, ensure that to take a look at a couple of different of my favourite Milwaukee breweries:

• MobCraft Beer – This brewery affords excursions and in addition has an awesome taproom with tasty pizzas, in addition to actually good IPAs and bitter beers.
• Eagle Park Brewing Firm – They don’t supply excursions, however they do have an enormous choice of distinctive bitter beers.
• Good Metropolis Brewing – There are two places: the Eastside one affords excursions, and the downtown one doesn’t. However the latter is true throughout the road from Fiserv Discussion board and excellent place for a beer earlier than a recreation.

6. Do some inexpensive actions

Milwaukee has far more to do than we might squeeze onto this web page, however we’ve narrowed it down, specializing in must-do and budget-friendly choices (some are even free!):

• Bradford Seashore – It is a sandy park on the shorelines of Lake Michigan. Deliver a towel and go for a swim, take part a recreation of seashore volleyball, or seize custard at MooSa’s or lunch at The Dock Waterfront Bar & Grill.
• Stroll the Milwaukee Riverwalk – Expertise the guts of town, and immerse your self in its tradition. Lots of the Milwaukee’s greatest retailers and eating places might be discovered alongside the three-mile route alongside each side of the Milwaukee River.
• Disc-golf at Milwaukee County Parks – Milwaukee has 11 disc-golf programs — six full ones ($5) and 5 short-practice ones (free).
• Bike the Oak Leaf Path – Milwaukee County affords over 135 miles of trails for biking, a lot of which function scenic views of Lake Michigan. Yow will discover the path map right here.
• Bronze Fonz – Cease to take an image with a bronze sculpture of Arthur Fonzarelli, aka the Fonz, from Joyful Days (a sitcom a few Milwaukee household within the Fifties).
• Indoor garden video games at third Road Market Corridor – Get pleasure from quite a lot of distinctive eating places and free indoor video games, together with large Jenga, cornhole, shuffleboard, and golf simulators. It’s a enjoyable place, particularly when the climate isn’t nice!

After you’ve scoured this information, if you must fill any clean spots in your itinerary, we now have an in-depth checklist protecting the entire issues to do in Milwaukee.
 

7. Get pleasure from free-admission days

A few of Milwaukee’s high points of interest welcome guests at no cost on sure days. Watching the calendar can rating you free tickets that in any other case would set your group again lots of.

8. Chase low-cost completely happy hours

For higher or worse, the folks of Milwaukee take pleasure in their enjoyable instances intertwined with a beer or three. To kick off an thrilling night time in Milwaukee, head to the place the locals go: discover a good completely happy hour, or go to a budget-friendly dive bar.

• McGillycuddy’s – $1 faucets, $2 craft beers, $4 rails and mixers, and $5 appetizers (Tuesday–Friday, 3–7pm).
• Mo’s Irish Pub – $2.72 drafts, $5 wines (Tues–Thurs 4–6pm, Fridays 3–6pm); additionally free brewery shuttles.
• Milwaukee Brat Home – Joyful hour specials change every day (Mon–Fri 3-6pm).

9. Discover the colourful public artwork scene

Many locations round city have large-scale public artwork shows you can go to at no cost. Most of those items are in among the most enjoyable and classy areas. These are a few our favorites:

• Black Cat Alley – One of many largest areas devoted to public murals is positioned close to North Avenue, within the Eastside neighborhood. Along with the artwork, you’ll additionally discover nice eating places, breweries, and artisanal retailers.
• Sculpture Milwaukee – Yearly, this city-funded program shows sculptures by artists from the world over on Wisconsin Avenue. Some are everlasting and a few are modified out yearly, so there are all the time new issues to see.

From meals to free days and bratwurst to beer, Milwaukee has a ton of issues to do and see on a price range. Hopefully this checklist gives you a good suggestion of the place to start out!

Hannah & Adam Lukaszewicz are full-time journey writers and run the journey web site Getting Stamped, which is devoted to firsthand guides to their favourite locations all over the world. Once they aren’t touring the world, Milwaukee is the place you’ll discover them, and so they cowl their hometown in-depth on the web site Milwaukee Insider. You’ll be able to comply with their adventures on Instagram and social media @gettingstamped.