Start your day off right by eating a good breakfast. You can try the L Street Kitchen, PEGGS, the Original Pancake House, the Yellow Cat, Sunrise, Chico’s, Jeannie’s, or American Pancake House.
On Saturdays, you can buy fruits, vegetables, crafts, meats, flowers, and more at the South Bend Farmers Market.
See a South Bend Cubs baseball game at Four Winds Field.
The 16,000-square-foot ice trail and pond in Howard Park opened in November 2019. You can rent skates and skate on it.
The old Studebaker mansion, which used to be the Tippecanoe Place Restaurant for a long time, is now the new Studebaker Grill and Brewing Company.
The Potawatomi Zoo is the state’s oldest zoo. It has more than 500 animals, and kids can get close enough to them to enjoy them.
Copshaholm, the Oliver family’s home from around 1895, is on display at The History Museum.
Here is where you can find the best hotels near Notre Dame Stadium.
You can learn about the history of transportation and see old cars and news daily india presidential carriages at the Studebaker National Museum.
You can try local beers at South Bend Brew Werks, Evil Czech Brewery and Public House, Bare Hands Brewery, and Crooked Ewe Brewery & Ale House.
Visit Beutter Park in Mishawaka. It was built where the old Uniroyal plant was. It has lovely perennial gardens, bridges, and a slow-moving stream of water.
At night, you can see the “South Bend River Lights” sculpture near the dam in downtown or the “reborn” Studebaker Electric Fountain in Leeper Park, where the colors change.
If you rent a canoe, kayak, or stand-up paddleboard, you can take a trip down the St. Joseph River.
LangLab is a creative space in a 33,000-square-foot brick warehouse at 1302 High Street. There, you can see a play, concert, art show, or workshop.
Shiojiri Niwa is a 1.3-acre Japanese garden on East Mishawaka Avenue. It was built to show that Mishawaka and Shiojiri, Japan, are sister cities.
Take your whole family to Plymouth to see new movies at the Tri-Way Drive-In Theatre, which has four screens.
At Café Navarre, LaSalle Grill, Carriage House Dining Room & Gardens, or Render Kitchen & Bar, you can make a reservation.
At 441 East LaSalle Avenue, Corby’s Irish Pub is a great place to remember your college days. (This Corby’s is the “new” one. After it was used in the movie Rudy in 1993, it got a new name. The first Corby Tavern used to be south of campus at a place called Five Points, which no longer exists.
You can learn how to make jewelry, stained glass, prints, pots, and more at Make South Bend.
Since Rockne was the head coach, traditional Italian food has been served at the Sunny Italy Café.
Check out the newest show at either the South Bend Museum of Art or the Snite Museum of Art, or both.
Drive by the 1906 K.C. DeRhodes house on West Washington Street and the 1948 Herman T. Mossberg house in Twyckenham Hills, both of which are privately owned Frank Lloyd Wright homes in South Bend.
Go see a professional show at the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center at Notre Dame or the renovated historic Palace Theater, which is now the Morris Performing Arts Center downtown.
Every Friday of the year, the Game Room at the Griffon Bookstore on West Colfax Avenue is open until midnight, so you can try a board game adventure there.
Walk around Eddy Street Commons, a neighborhood just south of campus where people live, work, and play.
You and your whole family can eat a traditional Polish meal at a Catholic parish hall or a Polish fraternal hall in your area.
On Saturday, take your time and visit the antique shops, art galleries, bistros, and bars along Michigan’s Red Arrow Highway in Harbor Country.
Every month, “First Friday” is an evening of art, music, and activities in downtown South Bend.
Follow the Lake Michigan Shore Wine Trail in southwest Michigan to see some of the 15 wineries in the area and try some of their wines.
The Sunburst Races include a half-marathon, a 10K, and a 5K that all take place on city streets. The races this year raise money for Beacon Children’s Hospital.
At Rocco’s Restaurant on 537 North St. Louis Boulevard, you can enjoy the pizza and friendly atmosphere.
At St. Patrick’s County Park, you can cross-country ski through pine trees that, when viewed from above, spell out “ST. PATRICKS.”
The South Bend Chocolate Company’s Chocolate Museum and factory at 3300 West Sample Street is a great place for families to go.
Visit the Civil Rights Heritage Center on West Washington Street for a short but informative stop. It used to be the city’s segregated swimming pool, but now it is a place where you can learn about civil rights struggles in the past and present.
Erasmus Books is a classic, cottage-style used bookstore at 1027 East Wayne Street that is strong in almost every genre. You can get lost in the stacks and fall in love with a rare find.
At Fiddler’s Hearth in downtown, you can drink a pint and listen to real Irish music.
You can fly down the steep, snowy hills of Mishawaka’s George Wilson Park on an inner tube, and if your hands and feet get cold, you can warm up inside by the fireplace.
Step back in time to Indiana’s farmland days with a hearty breakfast at Lakeville’s Hilltop Restaurant and a hike in nearby Potato Creek State Park.
On the east side of the St. Joseph River, at Fire Arts Inc., you can learn to make sculptures, pottery, or jewelry.
The Indiana Michigan River Valley Trail is a 17-mile path that goes from Niles, Michigan, to downtown Mishawaka. It follows the St. Joe. On the trail, you can walk or ride a bike.
It takes 45 minutes by car to get to the beaches on Lake Michigan.
In Amish country, which is to the east, you can buy quilts and furniture made by hand. On Wednesdays, antiques and animals are sold at auction in Shipshewana. But be careful around the buggies that are pulled by horses.
At the Fischoff, the largest and longest-running chamber music competition in the United States, you can hear some of the best young musicians. Usually, about 125 groups from about 20 countries compete.
Check out Art Beat, a festival of visual, performing, and culinary artists that takes place downtown for a full day in the middle of August and attracts more than 15,000 people.
You can see animal barns, eat elephant ears and fried butter, and ride a roller coaster at the St. Joseph County 4-H Fair.
Get your binoculars out to get a better look at the two peregrine falcons that live in South Bend as they fly over the city. In the spring and early summer, you can watch them raise their young online.
At the Chicory Café in downtown, you can play a trivia game and get a snack, coffee, or alcoholic drink.
Stop at the Leeper Park Rose Garden to smell the roses, lilies, and daffodils. After years of being ignored, it was recently fixed by volunteers, and it was fixed again after the historic flooding in February 2018. Then, cross Michigan Street and turn around the new Lavender Labyrinth.
From July until the middle of August, you can go to Mishawaka’s Blueberry Ranch and pick a bushel of your favorite big, organic kind.
On a Halloween hayride through Bendix Woods County Park, you can bump, jostle, and settle into the straw.
Head down Western Avenue to Taqueria Chicago for real Mexican food, and then cross the street to Paleteria y Neveria La Rosita for Mexican ice cream with chamoy and Tajin as a dessert.
Come to Idea Week, which is a new festival in the area put on by the Idea Center at Notre Dame. In April, it brings musicians, comedians, and speakers who are known across the country to the area.
Shop at the Purple Porch Food Co-Op and eat there to support local farmers and enjoy the farm-to-table experience of the area.
Check out the murals painted by Chris Stackowicz ’99 along Ernie’s Alley, the back door to LaSalle Kitchen & Tavern, and the Morris Performing Arts Center off West Colfax Avenue. You can see how much you know about South Bend’s past and about the movie stars who have lived there.
On Dyngus Day, a Polish holiday the day after Easter, you can have a party with the people who live there. In Indiana’s primary election, there will be polka music, beer, and sausages, and politicians will be there trying to get people to vote for them.
And end the night at Nick’s Patio, which is a popular place to stop.