After seeing Castle Farms, we drove to Petoskey to do some shopping and then to the beach to find Petoskey stones. This is the state stone of Michigan. They are actually fossilized coral. It's hard to find them on the beach as they don't show off their beauty until wet or polished. Kim and I spent over an hour digging through the pebbles on the beach looking for them. We found a few small ones but the next day we found polished ones at a store for $5! I love mine :)
Our last day in Charlevoix we drove south to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park. The name comes from an indian story about a mother bear whose two cubs died crossing the water and forming the two islands off the coast. There are some large sand dunes along this stretch that are popular climbing even if you are not supposed to climb them!
This overlook warns about going down the dune as it takes about 2 hours to climb back up and there are hefty rescue fines if you can't make it!
Lots of people do it anyway...
Some go all the way down and even go swimming!
This is the recommended climbing sand dune. Bob stayed below and took pictures while David, Kim, and I climbed. I made it to the top that you can see, but it actually went on much further and David and Kim kept going for a while.
The lake to the east of the park is in two parts - one shallow - 12 feet at its deepest point - and one much deeper. The shallow one has boats up on boat lifts, with covers, out in the middle of the lake! You can walk right out to your boat.
From there we went to the Life boat station to see how rescues were done 100 years ago. There is a museum with life boats and apparatus and then they did a small example of a rescue using raggedy ann and andy as the rescuees. They use a breeches buoy to slide them to land on a rope. The breeches buoy is basically a pair of shorts attached to a life ring. Keep in mind most rescues were at night in stormy seas. Can you imagine being saved in this manner?
Lastly, we drove to Leland - an historic town that has the original buildings from the heyday of the fishing industry.
Fishing nets
A boat developed to go out fishing in storms and still survive! I think we need one of these!
The next day we said good-bye to David and Kim as they were still waiting for a water heater but the water was supposed to be fairly calm. It was a beautiful day. We couldn't believe how smooth the water was.
We decided to keep going while the going was good so we stopped for the night in Pentwater at anchor and kept going again the next day. We made it to Grand Haven Wednesday afternoon and docked on their free wall that is no longer free! Only $10 so we were happy to pay it as it is a perfect location in town. We walked around town a bit and saw a few more Loopers in the marina there. The town has a concert on the waterfront every Wednesday evening that we could hear from our boat followed by a beautiful light/water/music show directly across from our boat! Wow! This is done every night during the summer months.
Knowing that we were in for a couple of stormy days, we moved the boat to an inland lake away from the open water of Lake Michigan. We anchored there for two nights. After a heavy rain the first night we had this beautiful - complete - rainbow to great us in the morning. Can you see the pot of gold?
It was a nice anchorage and the locals love their water toys and we saw many speed boats towing rafts, jet skis, and pontoon boats.
This group of girls was having an especially good time!
We headed back to Grand Haven wall on Saturday morning. It was now beautiful and calm.
We spent Saturday shopping at the farmers market and touring Grand Haven on their trolley tour for a whopping 75 cents a piece! Some of the sites:
Spooky or quaint?
First Reformed Church that has burned down 4 times!
I forgot who built this one but isn't' it awesome?
This cute car can be yours for a mere $40,000!
The home is beautiful but it is more popular due to the paper-mache creatures they display in their yard.
The owner of this home discovered magnetic rocks in the water that he decided would cure all your ills. The only thing it cured was his bank account so he could build this beautiful home!
We also visited a small transportation museum that had a suitcase just like my mom's!
Walking the waterfront is a popular activity and many cute dogs are part of the parade. I loved this little guys ears.
Grand Haven is a popular spot and there was a constant parade of boats going up and down the river.
We loved Grand Haven but needed to keep moving. More bad weather was coming so we decided to move on the next day.
Docked at Grand Haven wall 7/16 & 7/19 - Anchored in Spring Lake 7/17 & 7/18
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