Saturday, August 8, 2015
Clay was up first this morning. It was still dark but we
were sailing very slowly alongside Mackinac Island. We saw the big Mackinac
Bridge come into view just as the sun was rising. It was overcast with low dark
clouds and not much of a sunrise plus it looked like an ominous sign for a bad weather
day. I had a hard time getting going even though today’s visit to Mackinac was
the big attraction in booking this trip for me.
We went to breakfast and I clearly wasn’t the only one feeling like a
late start. We had a whole half of the dining room to ourselves. It being the
weekend, I was hoping to treat myself to a special breakfast. Alas, the chef’s
special was burrito omelet and I was not up to taking that risk! I had oatmeal and
yogurt from the buffet. Clay had his usual fried eggs, meat, potatoes and bread
and cheese. Edgar told us he hoped to go ashore finally today. He and Servy seemed
like friends today and Servy even came over and offered to top off my coffee. I
guess the good mood was contagious among the dining room staff. I really do
hope that they finally got a chance to go ashore.
We were docked by 8am. We started debarking for our
excursions at 9am. Clay and I got called closer to 9:30am. That is fine. All
those earlier people were paying an extra $48 each for the buffet lunch at the Grand
Hotel. So, we went out onto the Arnold Transit Dock and walked up to Main
Street where they had 20-passenger horse drawn carriages for us. We rode around
the town area of the island’s south end for about an hour. This ride eventually
took us to Surrey Hill Carriage Museum. There were some old carriages in there,
but mostly it was a comfort stop with shopping. We looked around and used the restrooms.
I found and bought a patch and then we heard the loudspeaker announcement for
Saint Laurent passengers to go to the 30+ passenger carts. The 20 passenger
carts had 2 big draft horses. The larger carts had 3 big draft horses pulling.
Each cart’s driver had a microphone and speakers in his cart so he could give a
narrated tour. These consisted largely of awful jokes and puns with a
smattering of historical information thrown in. It was good, but I might have
been upset if I had actually paid for it. I mean, make no mistake, we paid for
it. But, it was included in our fare and I didn’t make the decision to give
them my money. They did give us each a souvenir pin as our ticket/pass ‘til
2:30pm so that was nice. Anyway, since the groups were getting scrambled by the
carriage number change, it didn’t matter how early or late you left here unless
you stayed too long that is! The next
stop was about a half hour ride through the State Park which was once the nation’s
2nd national park behind Yellowstone. This ride took us past the
cemeteries and for a photo stop at Arch Rock before dropping us at Fort Mackinac.
It dates from 1780 and was instrumental in the War of 1812-1815. They’re
celebrating their bicentennial. We were first told that we had an hour here and
we could have used it, but then they said that we only had carts available to
get us to the Grand Hotel until 11:45am. We left about 10 minutes early after
the 11:30am cannon firing. We got to go into the Grand Hotel and tour the
gardens and public spaces. We went in the shops and lobbies. We shared a sundae
at Sadie’s Ice Cream Parlor and rocked in the big porch’s rockers. Then we
caught another horse drawn taxi back to the dock where we returned to the cabin and changed into shorts
and had lunch. The day had faired off and the sun was brilliantly bright in a
cloudless sky. We think it got warmer than the 72F predicted.
Clay got his
salad at lunch. It was calamari Caesar salad with anchovies. He liked it. I had
a deconstructed beef & Guinness pie. It had a pile of mashed potatoes, a
pile of beef and gravy and a round of puff crust. I liked it. For dessert, Clay
had carrot cake and I had little strawberry eclairs with white chocolate sauce.
There were crazy crowds out on Main St. with people lined up outside
restaurants to go a seat, so we made the right choice.
I had been looking for a
cotton long-sleeved shirt since we started this cruise and without finding one yet I had
figured this was my best chance at it. But, I had no idea! We had made landfall
in t-shirt heaven, or hell. We looked in every shop before I made my choice. It
was a plain dark blue shirt with a small map of the Great Lakes and the words
along with Unsalted. I like it. I will have to hem it as I have all the similar
shirts and then roll up the sleeves. But, I didn’t really like any of the
ladies’ shirts I saw that could have gone unmodified. Clay bought a t-shirt at
Doud’s Market, the oldest grocery store in America. We went for the world’s
largest and absolutely worst shaved ices after to celebrate and mostly just
threw them away. They were a waste of sugar and ice. We used them as an
opportunity to sit on benches in the sun on the dock for a while though. We
went back to the ship. We had time to wash up and get a couple of Coke Zeros
before the afternoon lecture. Today we had a guest lecturer. We had Bill
Taggart, the Grand Hotel’s historian. He was good and entertaining. We sailed
right on schedule at 5pm. I thought we were going to sail west under the
Mackinac Bridge to get to Lake Michigan and I was right. So we went up to deck
4 and then aft on deck 5 to see the bridge as we sailed under. That was
probably the end of scenic cruising until we approach Chicago. Of course, we’ll
be doing that in the pre-dawn darkness so even if it were scenic we aren’t
likely to see it. I think we are supposed to be docked about 6am on Monday in
Chicago and off by 8am so we won’t see much. We knew that though and decided it
would be okay since we’ve been before. I was born there!
Dinner was good. Edgar told us he had seen us in a t-shirt shop! He said he got to go ashore for 30 minutes and he had gotten a souvenir magnet. He seemed happy enough with that. Clay
had salad and swordfish and strawberry ice cream with chocolate sauce. I had
hummus and fettucine primavera and the same dessert.
Entertainment tonight is
the onboard musical duo performing Karen Carpenter. We will definitely pass on that
and unless we find something in the limited TV line up go to bed early. We sail
all night, all day tomorrow and all night again to arrive in Chicago on Monday
morning and fly home. Fingers crossed for smooth water on Lake Michigan for 2
days!
