Dow Gardens — Attraction in Midland

We spent five hours walking the gardens and trails and forest. We were very disappointed that all of the water features (with the exception of the small waterfall at the front with the main stream, and the stream at the canopy walk) were empty, stagnant and/or non-working. All the little "streams" were dry. The main stream looks icky. Had the water features been cleaned and were functioning I would have given the park five stars. They looked really gross and ugly as they are. The only things we saw were butterflies and lots of chipmunks, which we were actually thrilled about because they're adorable! You can get some great pictures because you can get really close! We loved that! The gardens were very pretty but not as extravagant as I had expected from all the reviews. We did enjoy them very much. The walk through the forest was nice and calm, but shorter than expected. Did not see any wildlife in the forest. The "canopy walk" was very disappointing. I was looking forward to the rope bridge but it turns out that the rope bridge is only about 20' long and goes from the canopy bridge to a wooden pod lookout thing. It's cool to walk, but I would not really consider this a "canopy walk", and it's very short. (As we walked out there was a Red-tail Hawk flying above and screeching!) The pictures on the website had me thinking something WAY different about the canopy walk. Don't expect much and you won't be disappointed. So, all in all, was a very peaceful day and we really enjoyed ourselves. However, several things were very disappointing. Oh! My cappuccino from The Cafe, though, was great, as was my husband's coffee! The employees working in the cafe were incredibly nice and made us feel very welcome! One other note I will make is this, it's cool to be able to walk all over the grass wherever you want so you can find the "secret" trails. It would've been SO much better had the water features had water in them. Some had stagnant pond water with some fish, I think they were Bass. We saw one small Leopard frog and one turtle also..lol There is a small stream at the canopy walk that has little bitty fish in it you can see from the bridge and is also where the turtle was. Saw no bugs besides bees and butterflies near the gardens! Grounds are well kept! Very beautiful day! Lots of shade!! Enjoy! Btw, I used my bird app, called Merlin, but it only picked up a handful of birds. Nothing exciting besides the hawk. (App is cool as heck, fyi!! Download the whole country so you get those rare, odd, or displaced birds! Sit in the backyard and listen! Or go...

We had the most beautiful wedding for our daughter . The day of the wedding they called for rain but it was perfect. So beautiful and everything went better than expected. We parked in the Willow parking and had these 2 lovely girls escort us and our guests by golf cart to the the barn to get ready. Our guests to the Willow area that the girls had previously set up. Our music was easily set with an area to plug into and The minister was all set as well. We were also offered to have a golf cart ride to the wedding area from the barn from the girls. We had the Perfect wedding ceremony that we had ending with a dance to their favorite song.... a small finger food snack at the barn after with drinks and a small wedding cake for the bride and groom to share. It was delightful. They didn't want a reception. Just the small wedding so being able to have a place to have the small extras was perfect. We then had pictures to follow. As long as you are out of the barn at your allotted time, you can stay in the park and take pictures. The barn was the perfect place to get ready with a dressing room with a curtain. We were able to take pictures with the Mother of the bride and the bride. The Maid of Honor and the girls and kids and pass out flowers and boutonnieres. We had our gathering there and ended there. It was easy to clean up. We had little round tables but we pushed them together so people would not sit down. We didn't have enough time to get comfortable. We put them in the middle with white table linens and had the food displayed on the table. Everyone stood around talking, hugging, dropping their cards off and then we packed everything up in our wagons and walked back to the cars just a short walk away and loaded up our stuff. We were then able to stay as long as we wanted to finish the pictures. They were all so lovely. It was everything the kids could've asked for and wanted. They were then able to take a nice long honeymoon. I recommend Dow Gardens for your wedding destination. You save a lot of money and they don't feel like they missed out on anything The Barn, Park, Rest Rooms, Picnic Area were all so clean. It was just the nicest, cleanest place to have a wedding and it was gorgeous. It was a lovely...

Absolutely beautiful public gardens. Our family visited Dow Gardens and we loved it. We spent hours walking paths through flowers fields, vegetable gardens, huge swaths of beautiful trees, rose gardens, and over various bridges with stunning views. It’s open until 8pm and you can do a lot in just an afternoon.

There’s a lovely cafe with indoor and outdoor seating, everything you order comes prepackaged and is decently priced, but portions are all snack size. Just next to the café is a pretty large natural playground area with a shallow waterfall and pond for kids to take their shoes off and run through. I wish I had known to bring a towel and water shoes, thank goodness I had extra clothes packed. A small area for changing the kids into dry clothes would have been nice but there are restrooms and a changing table inside the cafe just a short walk away.

Admission is $10 per person for a day pass, babies are free. They offer seasonal passes but we don’t live in the area so we didn’t look into those. Worth the price though. We spent about $60 for a family of 4, kids were tired after about 3/4 hours, there was plenty to see in that time and everyone was so polite, it really was a wonderful day spent amongst the flowers.

There’s also a lovely gift shop and plenty of parking available, I would recommend this place to anyone, especially gardening enthusiast and families looking for a day away together. Just outside of the gardens into town are some really lovely restaurants and a ton of shopping. There’s a just a ton to do you won’t be disappointed with a trip to...