Mackinac Island

Yesterday we met up with Marcia & Joe for a day on Mackinac Island. Our adventure began with a 15 min. ferry ride on Shepler's Ferry from St. Ignas. On our way to the island we saw several light houses, the Mackinac Bridge and views of the houses on the island along with the Grand Hotel.

Arriving on the island, we started down Main St. in search of some lunch. We found a nice place with a patio ordered some food and settled in. Joe & Marcia had a whitefish basket which they said was good. Dean and I split a order of cheese fries - we weren't very hungry because of a late breakfast. It was nice sitting on the patio watching the activity including the moving of supplies by horse and wagon. I'm sure ya'll know that there are no automobiles on the island. Transportation is by bicycle, horse and carriage or by foot!

I had posted on Facebook that my impression of the island was "stinky". I'll explain. Since horses are used in large numbers on the island as a way of transportation, there is bound to be some odor, but I never expected it to be so bad. The horses of course have to do what comes naturally and where else but on the streets. Therefore, there are streams of horse urine running beside the curbs of the streets and piles of horse poop in the streets. I'm really surprised that they don't require the bags behind the horses to catch that! I never did see anyone cleaning up after them either. It was like having the barnyard smell in a town.
STINKY!!!

After lunch, we walked more of the Main Street, I became a real "fudgie" since I bought some fudge - every other shop was a fudge shop! It was nice though since all the shops gave samples. That was our dessert.

We talked about taking the carriage tour but none of us wanted to ride the "commercial" one along with 18 other people. We inquired about a private ride but the wait was way to long and it didn't go where we wanted - Arch Rock. One guy said his company didn't go there because it was to full of horse urine & poop!! So, we opted out of that.

After several hours we caught the ferry back to St. Ignas and made arrangement to meet later for dinner and some more casino fun. Well, dinner was great but I'm not setting foot back in this casino - it took my money and didn't really let me play very long. I believe Joe & Marcia fared a lot better - luck was with them, not us.

We bid farewell to Marcia & Joe. They were heading north today, toward the Soo-Locks. We will be in St. Ignas till Friday. We will do some sightseeing and get some work done on the Jeep while here.

I will say, back to the island for a minute, that the hotels were pretty. I will be uploading some new pictures from yesterday to Picasa very soon, so be sure and take a look.

Till next time...Safe Travels.....