Tulip Time Festival, Holland Guide

Every May, the Dutch-founded town of Holland on the southwest lakeshore plants roughly six million tulips along its streets, parks, and downtown and throws Tulip Time, one of the biggest flower festivals in America and one of the oldest, running since 1929. For ten days the whole town blooms: costumed Dutch dancers clack down the streets in wooden shoes (klompen), a working 250-year-old windmill named De Zwaan turns on Windmill Island, and there are two full parades — the Volksparade with its street-scrubbing tradition and the Muziekparade. Most of the color sits within a few miles of downtown, and in a good bloom year the tulip lanes along the streets are almost cartoonishly vivid. It’s Michigan’s spring showpiece.