Duluth is an pretty cool city. Absolutely beautiful weather in the non-winter months. It never gets old driving down the hill and seeing the Lake Superior stretch as far as you can see. When I left last year the roads were just awful in spots, like major roads that everyone uses, 4th street has so many bumps and pot holes, hopefully they started to patch that road up. They redid 21st ave my senior year, and that was awesome.
If you're looking at places to move to in Duluth, avoid West Duluth generally. Lincoln Park isn't too bad. I lived in Central Hillside for 3 years and it was fairly cheap and not a bad area, I could walk to the Whole Foods which was nice, it just looks sorta run down in parts. Really there aren't any huge stretches of "bad" neighborhoods to avoid in Duluth, there are like little concentrated pockets that are pretty easy to recognize.
Restaurants to check out:
Amazing Grace - fantastic sandwiches
At Sarah's Table - pretty solid cafe type place, but with more food
Big Daddy's Burgers - Probably my Favorite burger place in Duluth
Sir Ben's - my bar of choice, it's a pub-like atmosphere, it's not full of insanely drunk 20 year olds with fake IDs, but it's got some solid food and good beer and good people. I love the Russian guy that works there.
Duluth Grill - legitimately my favorite restaurant in Duluth. Food is very local (they have a pastie that has all its ingredients come from Wrenshall), a great place, gets very busy.
Uncle Louis cafe - a Hangover breakfast staple, people love this place. I'm not the biggest fan but I'm not a fan of "traditional breakfast".
Fitgers - pretty good food, but great local beers
Canal park Brewery - again, food/beer
7 West - beer/food
Burrito Union - It's ok. Not super amazing but owned by Fitgers so they've got that beer.
Go across the bridge to Superior to go to Anchor Bar (crappy service, cheap and good burgers/beer), there's a few other superior bars I heard good things about but never went to.
There's probably some more restaurants I'm forgetting but that's a decent list.
Grandmas is meh. The Grandmas/sports bar in Canal Park is absolutely ridiculous on the weekend nights, filled with horribly drunk college kids.
Understand that when you go there in July, the city is ridiculously more active and full of people and life then when it gets to the Nov-March times. Personally I preferred the winter times, when the city was just College kids and locals. Definitely look at joining the curling club if you move there, super fun, lots of drinking, good way to not get bored during winter. Also a season pass to Spirit Mountain if you ski/snowboard. Duluth during the summer and during the winter are like two different cities.
Check out Park Point, just a beautiful area, a sandy beach on Lake Superior, right across the Lift Bridge.
Enger Tower is beautiful, check that out for sure. Hawk Ridge is another great place with a good view, during the fall with the leaves changing it's a view that can't be beat. There are so many parks/nature areas around Duluth I don't really want to just list them all, but Chester Park is a classic.
There's tons of beautiful things to see up the North Shore but I'll just limit this to Duluth and immediately surrounding areas.
Not sure how you're driving to Duluth, but if you're going up 35, stop at Cloquet and go to Gordy's Hi Hat, great, cheap burgers, a local institution, only open during the spring-fall.
I really enjoyed my time in Duluth, but I'm also really glad I moved back to the cities. People in the cities complain about roads, but they have NO IDEA how bad roads can be. Duluth has to have the most smokers of any city in Minnesota. Duluth doesn't really have many ethnic foods. As a theatre/orchestra lover I'm glad I can go see one of the top Orchestras in the cities, and I'm glad there are so many top-notch theatre productions, not to mention getting to see touring musicians/comics, and going to professional sports games. There's just so much to do in the cities that I was missing in Duluth. I do miss the Duluth air - cold, fresh, clean. I miss the lake and I miss the nature and I miss that big ol' hill, despite the headaches it caused me. I miss the smaller feel of the city at times, and I miss driving up to Grand Marais and stopping at state parks along the way. It's a beautiful area, and Duluth is a city on the rebound.
