Mackinac Island and Petoskey

Hey Europeans!

This weekend we went up to Michigan and to Mackinac Island (pronounced MACK-IN-AW)!  Click here to see it on a map.




Mackinac Island - at the pont where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron meet

Mackinac Island is really cool because they aren’t allowed motorized vehicles, so they use horses! Also cool because it’s famous for FUDGE... The boat ride was FANTASTIC because you could see the waves... I LOVED IT!!!!!!

We went on a guided horse and cart tour, and my favourite part was when we went to an old fort and we climbed to the top! They had a different fort where they fired off cannons like at Edinburgh, but it wasn’t open.

Our horses were called Leah and Doug

Mackinac Island used to be home to a group of Native Americans who believed it was ‘the great turtle’s shell', and later it was a British colony (hence the forts).

Fort Mackinac

Climbing up to Fort Holmes - the highest point on the island

The view from Fort Holmes

  In the winter Mackinac Island is totally cut off from the mainland by ice when the lake freezes and the boats can't run.  They have to wait for an ice bridge to form (which they can cross on snow-mobiles) or take an aeroplane.  Click here to see a film clip of what it's like there in the winter...


WE HAD A GREAT WEEKEND!!!!


In the hotel, there was an INDOOR SWIMMING POOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   It had a spa !!!!!!!!

On the way home, we stopped at a place called Petoskey. We bought a Petoskey stone which is fossilized coral. It is only found in North-West Michigan. We found some Petoskey stones on the beach too.

A Petoskey Stone (the ones we found were much smaller than this, but you could still see the coral)

Hunting for Petoskey stones

We stopped for lunch in a place called Elk Rapids and we had pasties.  They were not as good as grandma's though...

The weird sunken forest at Elk Rapids

The weird mis-shapen pasty at Elk Rapids