Took one of my first real vacations this weekend and went to Mackinac Island. After going there, I can honeslty say that I have a huge appreciation of the way folk who lived 100+ years ago carried on their daily lives. The entire island is similar to going back in time. There are only three vehicles total on the island. A police car, an ambulence, and a fire truck. That is all. People who live on the island (around 700) get around by either bycicle, or walking. I probably walked a good 20-30 miles while on the island and it was absolutely awesome to not have to "be somewhere" within a set period of time. We stayed at the Grand Hotel which runs around $700/night and is a 5 star hotel. Even there, the interior and exterior is decorated the same as it was in the early 1900'*/late 1800'*. You are not to be seen wandering the hotel after 6 PM unless you are in your 'best' clothing. (Full suit and tie.) The breakfast/dinner was included in the $700/night price, and the dinner was a seven course meal! It was really good I'd have to say. lol. All workers in the hotel are foreign, or black, in order to mimick those who originally worked at the hotel. It truely makes you feel as though you're living in another time, not a current one. It was a fantasy island for me, that'* for sure. I loved life in this mode as well.

On the bridge heading to the island. The bridge connects the lower peninsula and the upper peninsula of Michigan. You have to take a ferry from the U.P. to the island. (about 15 miles away from Michigan)
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On the bridge itself:
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The Ferry we took to get to the island:
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You'll notice some pictures have poorer quality than most of them. Those pictures were taken with my camera phone.

And now, back in time... This is the Grand Hotel we stayed in:

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Much of the Hotel is lit from the outside at night. It looks amazing from far away!
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An example of a lighting fixture that can be seen throughout the hotel:
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The room we stayed in:
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Old photograph of the hotel that was hung on a wall on the 4th floor.
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We snuck into the garage where the carriages for the hotel are kept, and the horses. "taxis" on the island are all horse drawn.
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This is the dining room of the hotel. It seats 900 people. It is huge!
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Second class stairwell.
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The town of Mackinac. Notice all the horse-drawn carriages and how old-styled the homes are. Most of them were built in the mid 1800'*. No homes have drive-ways either as they were not needed. A gate was used for most homes to walk through from the street or sidewalk. Definatley different than most of us are used to!

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These pictures are of Fort Mackinac. Before the USA acquired the land that is now Michigan and upper Michigan/the islands off of Michigan, the British were in control of Mackinac Island. They built a fort there during the revolutionary war to defend the island. The fort was never used though for any battles.

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Excellent, thanks for sharing, Man that must have taken you along time to post those pictures.

Lol. You have no idea. heh. There were around 1,300 pictures originally and I sorted through them all to take just a 'few' in comparison. I eliminated around 1,000 pictures! Then I resized them all and re-saved them to compress the images. Finally, I tried to organize the pictures somewhat so that they didn't look so scattered. Then came the uploading to photobucket. lol. I think I spent around 4 hours total with the pictures.

Wow nice pics. I'd like to go there sometime.





Oh... why did you take a pic of Horse poop?

shouda had Barney with you, he'* a poop expert!

Very nice pictures.

My wife and I really enjoy going to the island too.

How awesome!! Love the pictures. It would be neat to visit a place like that Thanks for sharing with us

nice pics,

but it looks like every one there is a 100yrs old..

Wow, even stayed in the Grand! Thanks for sharing the pics. I've been there many times, but was really little when we got a tour of the Grand Hotel. We were just there in July and I kind of wanted to take the tour, but we didn't really want to spend the $15 or whatever it was.

I don't know if you watch the Tigers at all, but when we went (we stayed in Mackinaw City) I met pitcher Mike Maroth at the pizza place. That was cool.

FYI - The movie "Somewhere In Time" (w/Christopher Reeve...serious chick flick...my wife made me watch it) was filmed at the Grand Hotel.

And if my memory of early Michigan history hasn't failed me, Mackinac Island was first "owned" by the French, as was much of Michigan. Thus the reason for the numerous French-named, oddly spelled landmarks - like Sault Ste. Marie ("soo saint marie"). Mackinac is pronounced Mackinaw, BTW, so don't go callin' your travel agent and tellin' 'em you wanna stay at Mackinack Island. Detroit was also named by the French, and was pronounced "day-twa". But, as is par for the course, the French eventually got their a$$es kicked out of there and "day-twa" became Detroit (DE-troit for dweebs, de-TROIT for happenin' folk).

Sorry about the French comment...I couldn't resist a little jab. Heh, heh.