Heading to Traverse City then to Petoskey during the 4th of July weekend. Would like to have suggestions on great places for lunch and dinner that have a great atmosphere and would be something unique to the area. Also, would like to visit a few wineries while in the Traverse City area. Please suggest your favorite 3 or 4. Any other must do's while in the area would be appreciated. We will be staying 2 days in each city for a long weekend and plan to see the Cherry Fesitval on one of those.

TRAVELBUG, Our favorite in this area is Old Mission Peninsula! It is a scenic drive filled with a lot of wineries (one of my favorite's was in a small old church!) Check it out at: http://www.oldmission.com/

Thanks for the info!!! Still looking for any other suggestions from anyone's recent trips through this area.

The Cherry Festival is crowded and will make driving Front St. in TC nearly impossible. However, the fresh cherries are amazingly delicious! There's an airshow one of the days - I'd suggest being at the Cherry Festival that day. The planes fly over the bay and it's beautiful. Every other year the Blue Angels are at the air show and that's always fun. I cannot remember if they are there this year - I'm sure you can google it and find out.

Blackstar Farms winery is a beautiful facility and was worth the stop.

cd - I have just spent about two hours on oldmission.com and loved it. What a great website. It gave me so many suggestions for our trip up that way in two weeks. Thanks.

So very glad leeleelew, hope you can write a report when you return. Have a great trip!

If you have time, try to check out The Cherry Republic in Glen Arbor.(very close outside of Traverse City) It consists of a winery, bakery, cafe, & gift shop all in a charming setting. It's a great place to sample and purchase a wide variety of items all made from locally grown cherries. The cafe is very good for lunch. We found so many delicious things we had to have them shipped home. They have a shop in downtown TC, but not nearly as much fun as the other location.