Mackinaw City & Mackinaw Island

8/29/2007
This is the Mackinaw Bridge that scared me when I had to pass those trucks on such narrow lanes. The bridge is 5 miles long so you can't see all of it in this picture. These are the main spans the rest is more like a cos way but still narrow lanes. The bridge is celebrating it's 50th birthday this year. It was opened in 1957. So far it hasn't collapsed. :-) We are camped at the Mackinaw Mill Creek Campground. It's about 3 miles down route 23 from Mackinaw City. It has 600 camp sites and is full for the Labor day Weekend, so tomorrow we must move on. You should see the RVs poring into the campground. They have a man out on route 23 making the incoming RVs pull of the road on the right to keep from blocking the highway. The RVs are backed up a block waiting to get in and register.

The Mackinaw Bridge, remember to click on it, it is much more impressive in full screen.

8/30/2007
We took the ferry to Mackinaw Island today. The campground has a free shuttle to and from the boat dock. They pick you up with an old school bus that has a small trailer on the back to load your bikes on. The ferry cost $18.00 a person round trip and $7.00 for the bike.


This is the first view of Mackinaw Island as you approach it from the Mackinaw City side. There also are boats coming in from the north side of the bridge. They are coming from St Ignace on the north shore. The picture is of course the Grand Hotel. If you remember the movie with Christopher Reeves, "Lost in Time" this is where it was filmed.

A light house at the entrance to the Mackinaw Island Harbor.

This is a view of part of the harbor with people waiting for their boat. There are about four ship lines that bring people to the island. Ships are coming in and out continuously. Our ship runs ever half hour. The trip across takes 20 minutes on a fast boat.

A view of the shore line coming into Mackinaw Island.

A view of the bike trail which goes all around the island. There are no motorized vehicles allowed on the island. The trail around the island is 7.1 miles. There are more bikes per square mile on it than in China.

Arch Rock it is about two miles from town on the bike trail.

This is a black squirrel. We saw quite a few on the island. We also saw grey and red squirrels on the island. This fellow was scrounging in the picnic area.

This was one of the picnic areas on the trail. This one was about half way around the island and had rest rooms and a small restaurant with sky high prices. Peggy bought potato chips. They didn't have any of the regular kind, they only had homemade potato chips. She got a small paper sack full for $2.00. I'm calling it a trail but it was actually a two lane blacktop road. Since they have no motorized vehicles on the island they use horses to transport the heavy items. They also have carriage rentals. There is a man who goes around with a wheel barrow and shovel, cleaning up after the horses. I don't know which smells worse, exhaust from cars or horse s--t.

I got this picture on the return trip. This type of boat produces a picturesque rooster tail. Peggy has her bike helmet on to hide her hair which after wearing the helmet all day her hair doesn't look like she just came from the beauty parlor. Woman are are such vain creatures, glad men are not that way. :-) Just kidding ladies. To be truthful I had mine on too, but I was just keeping my head warm. :-)