Travel

This post was originally published on another blog of mine (www.WhereLocalsGo.us), which I have since ceased using.   I have moved all posts to my main blog for the sake of simplicity — Jen 6/12/09.

Because we were part of a tour, the second day on Mackinaw Island started with breakfast & an informational meeting. To get to our meeting, we had to walk past a fabulous-looking buffet in the Round Island Bar & Grill in the Mission Point Resort’s Main Lodge. Our fare was a little less elaborate. In addition to normal breakfast buffet fare such as fruit, oatmeal, yogurt, etc., there were blueberry pancakes, tasty omelettes, biscuits and gravy….everything was definitely a cut above in appearance. If breakfast had not been included each day, we would have checked it out for sure.

After the meeting, we took a group walk up to the fort. Fort Mackinac is a step back in time. You can hear the canon go off throughout the island every so often during the day. At the entrance, you are met by a young man or lady in period garb. They also have the governor’s honor guard of Boy Scouts & Girl Scouts who alternate weekends at the fort, acting as guides & completing service projects. The fort has exhibits in most of the buildings and one building had great interactive kids exhibits. You can play period songs like Yankee Doodle on the fife in one room & in another, the kids can dress up in period clothing & get their pictures taken. Like any good museum, there is a Suttler (period term for store or gift shop). Although the fort is after the time period we reenact, we went in looking for resources we could use at Rendezvous. I got a great list of books to buy. There is also a restaurant in one of the buildings that has a stunning view of the island and the straits with outdoor seating.

For lunch, we walked downtown to the Pizza Buffet (w/35-item salad bar!) that they were pushing via flier the day before. Located in the Murray Hotel, you enter to the wonderful smell of fudge in the lobby–I think selling fudge is a rule of doing business. At the back of the building is a room with LOUD floral wallpaper otherwise decorated in pizza place, a la Pizza Tycoon. They have breadsticks (the best thing they had), a dessert pizza with pie filling on top and about 5-8 different pizza’s, plus the 35(!) item salad bar for $7.95/adult AYCE. As my husband said, “This pizza deserves Ranch.” It was marginally better than average frozen pizza. The crust was really tough & they didn’t properly label the pizza toppings. My ham & pineapple had undisclosed onions.

We didn’t do much else on Saturday; I’ll write more about our trip next week.

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This post was originally published on another blog of mine (www.WhereLocalsGo.us), which I have since ceased using.   I have moved all posts to my main blog for the sake of simplicity — Jen 6/12/09.

This year, I won a trip from the Walk Michigan program for a 4-day, 3-night stay on Mackinaw Island to do the Labor Day Bridge Walk. I decided this was a perfect opportunity to start up this site since I had a lot to write about. As a resident of Traverse City, Michigan, I no longer qualify as a local. Since I grew up an hour south of Mackinaw City, I am taking the liberty of considering myself a local anyway. When I lived up there, we frequently went to Mackinaw.

As a part of our package, we had tickets on the Arnold line ferry in Mackinaw City. I’ve never used Arnold before; I usually end up on the Shelper’s. Going to their respective websites, there is only a $2.00 difference in price. It’s about $25/adult and $7.50 per bike. The Arnold line has the only catamaran service to the island and as a result, it is the smoothest ride I’ve ever had. The catamarans are quite large — the have two enclosed lounges & an open air deck. There is also ample room for luggage carts & bikes. I will definitely use them on future trips.

If you’ve never been to the island, you’ll want to take your bikes if you want to see a lot of it–there are no cars allowed. You can rent them on the island and most of them are about the same price. They seemed to range from $5-9/hr. with longer term rates available. You could also use horse-drawn taxi’s or rent a private carriage. The larger outlying hotels have shuttles to their hotels; the taxi for Mission Point Resort from the center of town was $4.75/adult.

Lodging was provided at the Mission Point Resort as part of the trip. It’s pretty much at the very east edge of town and is about a 25 minute medium-paced walk. Going to this resort made me think about what it must have been like to vacation in the 50′s, a la Dirty Dancing. They pass out an event schedule for the day with things like croquet & bingo. They have a great front lawn on the water with intimate clusters of Adirondack chairs and plenty of room to throw frisbees or fly kites.

The staff at the resort was very nice and were from all over the world–it had a very Disney kind of feel except that it’s more authentic. They have a moose mascot who does various events throughout the day. Kids can even get tucked in by him at night! They had a dive-in kids movie playing at the pool and there is even a Kid’s Club for the kids while the parents are off doing other things.

Mission Point Resort is home to the Tower Museum. It rises 8 stories above ground level and has 5 stories of exhibits including Native American Heritage, Early Mackinac Island Life, Maritime Shipping History, Shipwrecks of the Straits, Building the Mackinac Bridge, and Michigan Lighthouses. They are also home to the Seventh Heaven Salon/Spa & Health Club, as well as an 18 hole executive grass putting green. In addition to a deli/convenience store, the resort is home to 3 restaurants; a fine dining establishment and 2 casual dining bars/bistros.

I don’t think we had a special room, but even so, it was rather spacious. Our room was in the main Lodge and had a queen bed nicely set at angle instead of your normal hotel room. There was a quaint little desk and the TV was (thankfully) hidden in an armoire. There is no AC — their website explains it like this:

“Normally mild summer temperatures and cool lake breezes along with our guests’ desire to maintain the historical character of Mackinac Island, precludes the need for air conditioners in our guest rooms. For your convenience, all rooms are equipped with ceiling fans and guest room windows are designed to open to enjoy the fresh air you only find on Mackinac Island.”

Perfectly worded. It was in the high 80′s or early 90′s while we were there and if we had left the fan on & windows open, we would have frozen!

Next week, I’ll share more of what we did while we were on the island.

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