Petoskey to Charlevoix, Mi

The first photo shows the clear water along the white stone breakwater wall in St. Ignes, Mi. The second photo is Muriel riding her bike in St. Ignes. The third photo was taken at the lunch buffet at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. The fourth photo is looking along one half the front porch of the Grand Hotel. The last photo is a natural arch on the north end of the island looking down into Lake Huron.


We fueled up and left Petoskey on Thursday. We had a nice but short trip along the coast line to Charlevoix, 18 miles to the southwest. This is another affluent community with a brand new marina. We got the dingy down and explored around the area and out into Lake Charlevoix. There are some very large boats here. One, Cracker Bay, is 162 feet and belongs to the man who owns Cracker Barrel Resturants. Last night Muriel and I went for an evening walk with Carlie and wound up walking out the breakwater to the light house. We noticed a lot of light out on the lake. It turned out to be another large boat called CV9. This boat came in through the canal into Charlevoix. It passeded only a few feet from where we walked along the break water. There were guards on either side of the boat and a smaller boat following with a guard in it.
Yesterday a group of loopers went to an oriental restaurant for a buffet lunch. We walked about a mile to the restaurant and along the way we passed a community ride vehicle so Muriel and Dianne walked over to talk to the driver and he said that he hauls senior citizens around the community and he would pick us up if we would call. So we got a ride back to the marina in the rain. We are not moving today because there is 100% chance of thunder storms and gusty winds. We have already had several T-storms and heavy rains move through the area. This afternoon we will either walk around an area where the houses are called mushroom houses because they have only smooth curves, no corners or peaked roofs, or we will go to a show if the rain continues.


Sunday morning we are still in Charlevoix. The wind was questionable so we elected to stay put. I think we would have been OK to have traveled today but no one else was ready to go.


Yesterday Muriel, Dianne Wade, and I went for a walk to see the mushroom houses. We also stopped to see the new municipal library. This was an unbelievable library for such a small town. There are 2,000 full time residents, 20,000 in summer. We spent the day shopping and roaming around town. Today we will clean the boat and defrost the refrigerator.


There are more mega-yachts here than we have seen anywhere along the way. Last night there were four boats in the 150 foot range. One has security guards and a chase boat with a guard in it. There was a wedding at the marina last night. The bride and groom and later the entire wedding party had pictures taken standing on the bow of one of the boats.