Day 20

Monday, August 3, 2009

0730 Wake up. Get coffee. Wake up the kids, grab a quick breakfast.

0910 Leaving hotel.

0915 Stop at the shipwrecks tour gift shop so Ron can buy a souvenir hat and t-shirt.

0924 Stop at the Falling Rock Cafe and Bookstore again. The sign says it should be open but no one is there.

As we leave town, there is a brief discussion about where we are going exactly. We were not thinking of the same place so good thing we checked before we got too far down the road! Next stop, Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum.

1100 Lower Falls at Tahquamenon State Park. Entrance fee is $8 and it's raining. So we decide to skip it.

1112 Welcome to Paradise! Paradise, Michigan that is.

1120 Oh that is funny! We passed a set of mailboxes. One was a regular box. The other was about 6 feet higher and had a sign on it that said Winter Delivery. Do you think they might get a lot of snow here in the winter?!?

1122 Lots of places for sale here. Maybe they are empty lots.

1123 Whitefish Point - the cranberry capital of Michigan apparently.

1126 Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum. Much more crowded than I expected it to be. Perhaps the rainy weather is driving all the tourists here since they can't do anything else? To add to the atmosphere, the foghorn is blowing. Fog, wind, rain - perfect weather for a shipwreck museum!

12:41 p.m. Leaving the museum. On our way out we picked up a quick lunch. Basically snack bar/vending machine food but it's the only food around so we'll take it! Our favorite parts of the museum/lighthouse:
Felisa - the beach graveyard of ships
Ron - brass ship nameplates
Ryan - museum
Bella - the girl's room in the lighthouse keeper's house
Sheila - the museum and all the stories (including the story of the ghost of 3-Finger Kirby)

1:06 p.m. Movie time. Now showing - Open Season 2. It's ironic that now they are bugging me to watch it because they hadn't chosen this movie sooner to watch. It was one of the new (used) ones we picked up before we left on the trip but they hadn't watched it so I finally told them they had to watch it next. I said that before we got to Grandma's house in Illinois and they have been bugging me now to watch it. Be careful what you ask for, right?

2:02 p.m. Soo Locks in Sault Saint Marie. It is still raining so our visit is short. Fortunately we were able to catch the tail end of a ship passing down through the locks. I was expecting more of a series of locks as opposed to just one. Even still, it was interesting. We also saw the bridge to Canada and could just make out a bit of the Canadian shore through the mist.

3:30 p.m. Crossing the Straits of Mackinac. Lake Michigan on one side and Lake Huron on the other. We have now seen all 5 of the Great Lakes this summer!

3:40 p.m. Hotel

After we check in, we went for an early dinner at Dixie Saloon. Then we toured the Coast Guard Icebreaker Mackinaw which is now a museum.

Back at the hotel we checked the beach. Looks good but cold. The kids all voted to go to the beach rather than the pool so after a short rest, we went out. It was cold but that didn't stop them from swimming in Lake Huron! After 40 minutes, we pulled them shivering and blue out of the water and went back to the room for showers. Ron and Ryan went to see the Laser Light Show but it doesn't start until 10 so they came back. I tried to do some laundry but the dryers are out of order. I certainly don't need a bunch of wet clothes so we'll just make do for a bit longer.

Tomorrow we are headed to Mackinac Island and then start our drive towards home. 3 weeks is shorter than our other trips but it still seems just as long!