Our Vacation to Mackinaw City

Hey everyone!

I just got back from vacation late last week and we had a great time. I will tell you what happened;

Monday: We left our house at 8:45am (must later than planned) and we arrived at our destination at about 2pm. After checking in to our hotel, we went out to see the beach. It was gorgeous!

Afterwards, we brought all our luggage into our hotel room and put our swimsuits on. We played in the water and my baby brother AJ loved the sand and water!!! At first, Lake Huron was pretty cold but I got used to the temp after a bit of swimming. We went back to our hotel room a couple hours later and went into the Mackinaw Crossings outdoor mall. We bought some FUDGE and looked in the shops. We ate dinner at our fav restaurant up there, Darrows, and I split the huge chicken dinner with my brother. We wanted to get a dessert but they were all our of Coconut Creme Pie! We were very upset! : ( After eating to our content, we again went to the city and bought ice cream for dessert. I wanted to get my fav flavor Mint chocolate chip but my mom got some almond flavored one instead (it was nothing special). We looked inside a store where almost everything is made of wood! Here is a pic:

We went back to our hotel after that and my brother and I went swimming in the hotel pool. We went to bed after showering.

Tuesday: We got up early, went to breakfast, and left for Mackinac Island. We took the Arnold boat like usual. We were going so fast! If you don't believe me, look at this:

We passed the Mighty Mac on the way. Here is a pic of the port:

It was a great day to visit the island. We went to Fort Mackinac and watched them shoot the canon, looked in the tiny schoolhouse, and went in every building we passed.

We were starving when we finished up looking at the fort so we bought sub sandwiches at a deli and they were really good! After eating in the park, we took a long walk and sat in the same gazebo Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour sat in to make their movie "Somewhere in Time"! We are now part of that history. We stopped at a shop in a hotel and I bought a Starbucks iced coffee for us to share. That helped us make it back to the main downtown area again.

In a fun store called Shirt Off My Back, I bought a nice zipper hoodie that says Mackinac Island on it, my brother bought a camo hoodie, my dad bought a Mackinac sweater, and my mom bought a Mackinac Island shirt.

We shopped around more, bought a suvenior for Hallie (she was taking care of our garden while we were gone) and then had to head back to the boat to leave! We were so sad to leave the island but our feet were sore and we did enjoy the boat ride. When we got back, we ate dinner at Mama Mia's Pizzaria and we looked in the Mighty Mac Museum upstairs.

Wednesday: We went to Mills Creek, a historical area and we did something we had never done before! We all went on the ZIP LINE! It was sooo fun!!!!! Here is a video of me on the zip line:

We also watched a demonstration on how the old mills worked and I took a video of it:

After the zip line and the mill demo, nearly three hours had passed! But here are more details on the zip line. We had to walk across a cable bridge that was 40 feet above a creek, we hiked up the hill on a trail til we got to the drop off for the zip line which is over 50 feet in the air, and once all hooked up to the cable line, we put up our feet and took off on the nearly 500 foot long zip line! It was soooooooooo amazing and I felt like I was flying across the water! I loved it and it was just sooo cool! And it was only $5 a person too! After the zip line you get to go on a rock climb wall for part of the Adventure tour. Only me and my brother and sister did the rock wall. Here is a picture of me on the rock wall:

I was a bit nervous because at the very top, you are 4 stories high! That is like scaling a New York tower! Only my brother and I made it to the top but my younger sister made it half way up which is pretty impresive! Also, I did the difficult side that had less rocks but I like a challenge now and then and it was very rewarding to push the bird call at the top! : )

We went to Scalliwag's for dinner and my brother, sister, and I slipt the chicken basket which had 9 pieces of chicken (like chicken strips), four hush puppies, french fries, and cole slaw. I was a really good meal for a fair price too. My mom had their fish basket which is the same thing except fish instead of chicken. My dad had a beef pastie from his favorite pastie shop and AJ enjoyed a jar of baby food. : )

We shopped around after eating but didn't purchase anything. A few hours later, we went to dinner at Darrows. I had the vegetable beef soup which was very good. We finally had our piece of coconut creme pie too! Andrew got crabby from lack of a good nap so I took him to the gift shop area and he smiled and giggled for the lady at the cashier. We went back to our hotel after dinner and went to the Pirate Waterpark. It was lots of fun! There was waterslides and I huge bucket that dumped tons of water on us! My brother and I went down the waterslides backwards just for fun and we had a good time. When we had to leave it was so nippy out and it didn't help that we were all wet! We showered and hit bed soundly.

Thursday: We packed up everything after breakfast that morning. We decided to leave one day early because Friday was going to rain all day and be yucky and gross outside and before 50 degrees!!! But we made the best of the last day. We went to Fort Michillamackinac and looked around the artiface museum under the fort. It was lots of fun and I think Andrew liked it too! We went into a few of the buildings but after a while it started to sprinkle rain out so we went back to the main building and looked inside the gift shop. We went on the beach and I took this video for you all:

Thursday evening: We stopped at Taco Bell on the way home for dinner because it was almost 9pm and we didn't feel like we had enough stamina to make ourselves dinner (dramatization). I had a nacho supreme. We all went to bed after eating and Friday morning we unpacked, did about 5 loads of laundry (i did most of it but everyone helped fold) and we tried to get back into our routine.

Saturday: we went to a Fall Festival in a local city and saw our Aunt Tina and cousins and some friends of ours. We had fun talking and enjoying the music.

Sunday: we worked the Rotary Chicken Dinners from 10 - 1pm. It was lots of fun! I worked with my sister bagging cookies, then I put alluminum foil in boxes (not so fun), and then the best job was putting the boxes on the assembly line. The girl working next to me was very friendly and we talked together most of the time. After working the chicken dinners, we got a free one for our volunteer work and enjoyed our lunch and saw our Aunt Tina and cousins AGAIN! We were so happy to see them!

Monday we started up school again and my dad had to go back to work. Sorry it took so long to make this post but I had to wait forever for the videos to load. Enjoy and tell me what you think!!

Blessings,

Until Next time,

~ Butterfly