Mackinac Island

We spent day four of our tour of Wisconsin and Michigan on Mackinac Island, pronounced Mackinaw….

Mackinac Island is in the northern part of Michigan where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron meet. It sits in Lake Huron (another lake!) The fun part about the island is that no cars are allowed. So there’s a lot of walking, horses and carriages, and bikes. When we came out of the ferry station, the kids were enthralled to find horse-drawn taxis transporting guests to different hotels on the island!

Our family chose to bike the island first to get a lay of the land. Ryan rode on the back of Henry’s bike, Natalie had her own bike, and Ainsley and I rode a tandem bike.

I have to say this was my favorite part of the trip. We probably biked the path for an hour or two and I got so much joy from watching Natalie and Ryan enjoy their rides and listening to Ainsley’s chatter behind me. She talked the entire time.  Mackinac Island is where we got into Lake Huron. It was a very rocky shoreline reminding me of Henry and my honeymoon in Cape Cod.

Our traditional “family” picture in the lakes.

Hobbit #4’s view of the lake.

And our real family photo.

The island has many picturesque scenes like this one of famous arch rock.

This is The Grand Hotel… one of America’s fine resorts. It had a little hill leading up to it which happened to be very fun to ride down. So the girls and I rode up and down it a few times….

….while Henry rested his back.

We rode our bikes all through the interior after doing the exterior loop, stopping to have lunch and see things along the way. We stopped at the Butterfly House.

The kids had fun walking the room trying to find all the different colored butterflies.

We stopped at this field by the lake and let the kids play chase while we adults relaxed. The sun had come out by then and it was nice to sit in the crisp weather.

We finished the day with dinner, some more bike riding and a ferry ride back to our hotel on the mainland.