sailing

I've been to Lake Michigan many times and the view of a  sailboat on the water to me was calming .... majestic. The bucket list included being on a sailboat.

I found a brochure in the rented condo and I called Frankfort Sailing Excursions, LLC.

Captain John answered the call and put us down for Wednesday. He told me that he would call first thing in the morning after making sure the weather would be good for sailing.

True to his word, he called the morning of the sail and said it couldn't be a better day for sailing. Yay!

So we packed up the list of items he suggested we bring and headed off to the Marina.

We set off on the Elly, named after his mother. Turns out Captain John built the vessel himself top to bottom.

Sleeping Bear Dunes loomed in the distance.

I ventured to the front to get some photos, the winds were pushing us nicely and he gave us frequent updates on how fast we were going.

Of course, I had brought the wrong lens. I tried to keep down the amount of camera packing on a boat so I brought the telephoto lens.

Captain John told us that he worked as a shop teacher at Saline High School and had retired north. The charters were a way to pay for the property taxes and slip costs and he loved meeting new people. He underwent stringent testing to become a Captain and his boat is both Coast Guard and Michigan DNR certified.

I didn't get pictures of the inside of the boat, but it was mahogany and absolutely beautiful. It had 2 sleeping compartments and a nice comfortable living space. It's amazing that he built it from the ground up.

We were focused mostly on the views.

The feeling of sailing away.

It was beautiful and we were focused on the trip - that everyone neglected to mention sunscreen, even though I had packed it. Holly ended up with a pretty good sunburn on her face. (Sad face)

Burke got some mild sunburn on his legs.

It was easy to be distracted.

Right?

We pulled back towards Frankfort.

Waving to the people hanging out by the lighthouse.

Finally back into port. That's our condo right behind the boats - a beautiful condo overlooking the Marina in town.

The whole trip took a couple of hours. Captain John was very knowledgeable of the area and gave us some good tips of places to journey.

If you've always dreamed of sailing - I highly recommend it. Check it off your bucket list.

Don't forget the sunscreen.

mackinaw island

Dad picked the 3 of us girls up from the various places we were living (Kentucky and Ohio) and brought us to Michigan in 1978. Even after all those years, never have I been to Mackinaw Island, so the plan was made after signing up to attend the Karsnick Family Reunion of 2016 in Traverse City.

During our week vacation, we stayed in Frankfort, Michigan and after a very long day at Mackinaw Island we started back to Frankfort - nearly 3 hours. When the sun began to set, we stopped at Little Traverse Bay to snap a few sunset poses. I'm starting the post with this picture even though it was the end of the day cause it's one of my favorites.

You buy a ticket to ride the ferry from Mackinaw City to Mackinaw Island for roughly $25/person.

Shepler boats were new and fast. The entire ride took about 15 minutes and was very enjoyable.

We passed Mackinaw bridge on the way, which was majestic in itself.

Once on the island, we looked for a place to eat. The island was packed, but we finally ate at the Pink Pony which had a nice view of the marina.

No motorized vehicles are allowed on the island. Your journey consists of either a horse or bicycle.

So many people and bicycles.

Lunch at the Pink Pony waiting for our food, we passed around my hat and did some poses.

Burke set up this shot himself and posed with the flowers. Goob.

The marina and horse drawn carriage was a great picture. Julia is studying flags of the world and was happy to see so many flags displayed.

At the horse stables during one of our stops.

Love the red door.

Julia and Holly.

More carriages.

The coolest building I've ever seen. The walls consists of doors and windows. It was mesmerizing. The Indian rock, I wish I had captured what it said, but something like "if the rock is warm, it is warm, if the rock is swinging back and forth, it is windy...."

Our second stop was at Arch Rock that had a lookout built that rested on top of it.

The fear spread over my body but I went.

While these two were fearless, being up so high didn't phase them at all.

The views were totally worth it.

Amazing blue.

Boy Scouts were posed to lower the flags at 6PM in amazing ceremonial fashion.

Now we're back at the end where we started. Sunset at Little Traverse Bay. An amazing day. Really had a great time sightseeing.

geocaching!

I heard the word "geocaching" at work the other day and had no idea what it meant, so I asked The Googles.  I found that it's a gigantic scavenger hunt where people put out physical objects for you to find. Holly has to get 50 hours of driving in and I thought it might be fun to have her drive around while we look for geocaches.

It's our second day of hunting and our third geocache called Heigh-Ho, Heigh-Ho, Rodentologists. We found our way to the  Pittsfield Preserves where there are a bunch of geocaches.

We set out through the Preserves and immediately saw a skunk. Instead of taking a picture of it - I  immediately turned tails to run. But ... it wondered off the path and we then continued on.

The clouds starting rolling in and we were on our journey.

I kept stopping to take pictures of the flowers.

So many are in bloom right now and they were just gorgeous.

I couldn't help myself ... I started to lag behind the girls.

Julia is the one who has the keen eye and usually jumps right into the brush. She did find the geocache. I won't spoil it - but it was super creepy! She nearly jumped out of her skin when she saw it.

Holly pulled out the log for us to sign.

It was nearly filled up on both sides.

We signed it.

Then we put it back.

We set off to find another and we found the coordinates. After searching around and seeing the clouds get thicker, we abandoned the quest and headed back to the car.

We were about 2 steps ahead of the rain the whole time.

We made it back right before the rain came down. The girls loved it and we'll be going on more adventures!