James had a blast at Mackinaw City, perhaps his favorite is throwing rocks into Lake Huron right underneath the bridge, especially at night. We made sure to make time for his activity and also took him to Mackinaw Crossings earlier in the evening to shop for toys. Other activities he enjoyed were two trips over the Mackinaw bridge, which is the largest suspension bridge in the Western hemisphere (I think, people keep making newer and bigger bridges each year). It spans 5 miles between the lower and upper peninsula’s which is a larger span than the Golden Gate bridge. This time we tried to get some pics crossing the bridge as Mom worked the camera while Dad drove. As in past years, we ended the visit with a trip to Mackinaw Island and a visit to Sea Shell City.
Category: Monuments/Buildings
Monuments and special Buildings
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Mackinaw City and Bridge 2012
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Saulte Ste Marie 2008
One hour north of the Mackinaw bridge is Saulte St Marie, U.S. and Canada sides. The U.S. side is based on tourism, the Canadian side is based on industry. There are casinos on both sides if you like that kind of thing, we stopped at the casino on the American side one time before James was born and did ok. We did not go to the Canadian side since we did not have James’ birth certificate with us for customs.The ever important Soo Locks are located in Saulte Ste Marie and also an awful lot of history including a huge Republic Steel tanker that has been converted to a museum. It has many artifacts including the Edmond Fitzgerald life boats that were washed ashore after the wreck.
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Nashville City 2006
A very beautiful and fun city, although we never did figure out how to pay the parking there. Lots of attractions, street performers, museums, and restaurants.Once we knew for sure we were going on the Nashville trip, Mary made me promise to take her to “The Spaghetti Factory” restaurant in downtown Nashville (and also Bar B Cutie which is a take out place). As you can see from the photos, I kept my promise. Its a very cool restaurant with a trolley car right down the center.
Truly a remarkable town and well worth a visit.
On our way home we stopped at a couple of Mary’s old stomping grounds like her first apartment and such.
A very enlightening trip and everyone had fun this day.
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Mothman Prophecies Adventure 2006
Our journey took us to Charleston WV, Pomeroy OH, Marietta OH, and of course, Point Pleasant WV, the site of the Mothman legendIn Charleston, Mary visited where she lived during her college days. In Pomeroy we had a chance to cross the old bridge across the Ohio river and see the new bridge being built. Marietta is well known on the Ohio river as an up and coming resort town.
The main attraction was Point Pleasant and the TNT area (Mothman was first seen near abandoned ammo igloo’s on the outside of town, hence the name TNT area came into being). Their story was made into a movie called “The Mothman Prophecies” starring Richard Gere a few years back.
Although the movie was set in present time, the actual events happened in a span of 13 months, from Nov 1966 till the collapse of the bridge on Dec 15, 1967.
The most amazing thing that we noticed was the friendliness and helpfulness of everyone that we met at Point Pleasant. So if you are looking for a little mystery and adventure in your next vacation, check out Point Pleasant West Virginia!
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Mackinaw 2005
Our annual visit to Mackinaw and one of the largest suspension bridges in the world. Mary was a little under the weather today so James and I went to the Fort. It’s still pretty much the same way I remember it when I first went there with my mom and dad about 40 years ago or so. The thing I remember most about the Fort was the skeleton in one of the watch towers so that was the first place James and I went, sure enough, he was still there. James is much more mobile than he was at the last visit here so that helps, we don’t need to keep him in a stroller all the time. He enjoys running around in the open areas that they have at the fort and at the parks. He is not yet thrilled by the historical significance of some of the indoor displays at the Fort.
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Fort Mackinaw (Mackinaw Island) 2004
James, Mary and I visited Fort Mackinaw on both the city side and the island side. I personally liked the city one better although the island one was much better built as forts go. The Fort at Mackinaw City is primarily made of wood while the one on the hill at Mackinaw Island is made of stones with the wood on top.That evening we got to see a great fire work display that went on over the water. There is so much to do nowadays in Mackinaw that you really can’t see everything in just one weekend. The island alone would take that much time. I would say 5 days would be perfect, however we usually only stay for 3 or 4 but at least we never get bored.
We saw the cannons shoot off at both forts and that is pretty cool in any century.
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Fort Mackinaw (Mackinaw City) 2004
Visiting this fort is always much fun. There are two major historic forts on the Mackinaw straits. The one on the Mackinaw City side of the pond and the one on the hill on Mackinaw Island. Both were occupied at various times by England and France as they battled for control of the straits. The one we toured today was the one on the Mackinaw City side located nearly underneath the bridge.Dad remembers going on the tour as a child and there was a skeleton in one of the lookouts. The first thing Dad checked out was to see if that skeleton was still there and sure enough it was.
The tour is mostly a self tour with mini tours going on from time to time. They shoot off the cannon which is pretty cool and very loud. Bring your earplugs for that.
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Liberty Bell and Football Game In Philadelphia 1997
Friends who I went to grade school with are affectionately known as “the little friends”. Here are some of the little friends on a trip to Philadelphia to do a little bit of sight seeing, eat some cheese steak sandwiches, drink some beer, and watch a Lions game (or I should say a Lions loss, never saw a team like this that loses so much but has such great talent like Barry Sanders). The tailgate party by far was the highlight of the day, did not really want it to end but eventually we had to go into the stadium and watch the Lions. Turns out the game of kick the can in the parking lot was better than the actual game in the stadium.
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Mount Rushmore 1982
After Dad came home from Korea he wanted to have a car while he was at his new location stateside (Ft Lewis Washington). Dads Mom (Loretta) and Aunt Louise drove out with him to his new base on the other side of the country and would take an airplane home. While in route they made a slight detour to see Mount Rushmore in the Black Hills of South Dakota.Completed in 1941 under the direction of Gutzon Borglum and his son Lincoln, the sculpture’s roughly 60′ high granite faces depict U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.
After a quick visit the family continued onward to the Pacific Coast and Fort Lewis Washington.
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Washington DC 1980
Jimmy Carter was the President at the time of this visit. Iran had taken the U.S. Embassy hostage, and a rescue operation had failed. The day after the mission failed, James Dad decided to join the military to see if he could help out. James Grandma thought it might be a nice trip to fly into Washington for a weekend so we ventured off to the capital of the United States for a weekend excursion. The vacation included several bus tours which were nice and informative, but depending on what side of the bus you were sitting on you really could not take it all in. Most of the free time we had was spent at the Smithsonian or visiting the monuments and we found out we did much better on our own than with the tour, although the tour kind of gave us direction to where we wanted to go.
