Day 3: Part I - Mackinac Island

Note: I split today into two parts because of the large amount of pictures we took. I guess we had too much fun!

We started off the day by having breakfast at the bar in our hotel. Can't beat that view!

We didn't have any set plans, but since we'd already been in a horse drawn carriage yesterday we decided to rent bikes today and explore the island by bike. The weather forecast predicted 20-30mph winds so I put on all the clothes I had brought with me to the island and hoped for the best. We biked for about 10 minutes before I stripped down to my running tights and a t-shirt.

There's a beautiful highway that wraps all the way around the island. And yes, of course I went into Lake Huron (several times).

One of our first stops was at the Arch. An enormous natural arch in the mountains. Looking down from the viewing point we noticed some people found a longer lasting alternative to writing your name in the sand.

Suddenly Sandy shrieked and it turns out she almost biked over a snake! Luckily it was unharmed and I was able to find it and take a picture.

After 3 miles of biking along the shore we headed into the woods. Mackinac Island State Park was once the nation's second National Park. I'm  not sure how it ended up belonging to Michigan again, but it's truly a wondrous place.

Not the easiest path to ride your bike on! Gravel, mud and lots of hills made for quite a bit of hand walking the bikes.

We stopped at most of the tourist hot spots on the Eastern side of the island; Skull Cave, the cemetries, Sugarloaf and Fort Holmes and Point Lookout.

Point Lookout/Fort Holmes is the highest point in the island. Unfortantely that meant more stairs for us!

The view was worth it. The wind at the top was unbelievable ... on some of the pictures my hair is perfectly horizontal!

We headed back to the downtown area via one of the steepest hills on the island; Turkey Hill.

Great view of the harbor while coming down past Fort McHenry:

We were almost back to the hotel, but we decided to ride down Market Street first.



It strangely reminds me of Amsterdam in this picture.

Sun's coming out again! This shows the end of Market Street. We stopped across the road and walked down to the lake to take some pictures of the storm that was brewing right of shore.

You can see both the lighthouses in the picture above. The pebbles here were very fine compared to the ones by our hotel ... those really hurt my feet!

Can you believe these waves?! It's hard to believe it's a lake, but apparently they do surf on the Great Lakes.

 

Carriage ride anyone?

We noticed on the way back to the hotel that the wind was really wreaking havoc on the poor trees ... the roads were suddenly strewn with branches!

More than 3 hours after setting out we returned our bikes at the hotel. No sooner did we start walking towards the docks or it started pouring! It only lasted a couple of minutes so we just hid under a tree and then continued on our way.

The village electrician. We felt for the poor man as we watched him struggle to pack all his tools onto his bicycle.

It was already 2pm at this point so we decided to have lunch on the island at a restaurant called the Pink Pony (to stay with the horse theme, of course). Good food and nice view of the docks to boot ... found out as we were leaving they even have a big, big jacuzi on their patio. Maybe next time!

There's our ferry!  

We had 15 minutes to spare before boarding so we looked around in one of the souvenir shops and I actually found a super cute Mackinac Island wind breaker!

 *****

Continued in part II