Charlevoix revisited

A few posts ago we made reference to the beauty of the village of Charlevoix. Due to circumstances we were not able to get photo's during that trip. This necessitated a return trip!

As previously noted, the main street is lined with flowers, so to save a thousand words here are the pictures.
The marina in Charlevoix is second to none in my book. The marina sits in Round Lake between Lake Michigan and Lake Charlevoix. The west exit of Round Lake takes you out the cut to Lake Michigan and the east exit of Round Lake has you exiting into Lake Charlevoix, which is a substantual lake itself (15 miles long and over 2.5 miles wide). I've tried to capture some of the water sights here. The picture with Linda is the water front area immediately adjacent to the marina.

Of course there are some fantastic homes near the marina, here is one example.

This is the cut from the marina/Round Lake to Lake Michigan.

The Emerald Isle, a passenger and vehicle ferry, heading out onto Lake Michigan to go to Beaver Island thirty five miles away.

The next picture is the exit of Round Lake to Lake Charlevoix. The exit is in the backround of the photo.

Lastly, we include a sailboat that is coming in from Lake Michigan to the marina. There are many fine sailboats all around the state. This one is even equipped with solar panels which indicates to me that the crew spends a significant amount of time on board.

All this maritime stuff here has me (Terry) wanting to buy a good used boat (with galley, head, and sleeping quarters) and keep it in Michigan for our use in the summers!

Bay View and Castle Farms

This past weekend we pulled up stakes and moved the motorhome to Petoskey, MI for the weekend. It is about a 2 hour drive from Suttons Bay northward up the coast and takes you through the small city of Charlevoix.

Charlevoix sits between Lake Michigan and Lake Charlevoix. The city is one of those picturesque places that makes the local chamber of commerce's job easy. It looks great from any angle. The main street through town is lined with flowers, the businesses all face and partially surround the bay, and the recently updated city marina is close to the restaurants. To draw a better mental image, imagine the main street running north with the businesses and restaurants (several with outside seating) on the west side of the street. On the east side of the street the city has a narrow city park area with benches. Right at the park area is the marina, so when you are seated at an outside eatery you can gaze past the flowers to the boats that are only about 150 feet away. Very nice indeed.

So where are the pictures you may ask? Well, Charlevoix was in the middle of a celebration and street fair, so there was no parking available for anything the size of our motorhome. We hope to return to Charlevoix for pictures before we leave Michigan.

We arrived in Petoskey and set up shop in the Petoskey KOA (Kampgrounds of America). The campground was absolutely packed with campers and RVers. Each campsite was equipped with at least 8 kids and all their toys. Each evening the campers fired up their camp fires and created so much smoke we thought the campground would make the TV news as a wildfire. We were glad to stay only 3 nights at the KOA.

We did go to the adjacent community of Bay View, MI. Bay View has many old homes worthy of a stroll and viewing. We had a pleasent smoke free walk and aquired a few photo's. Here are some examples of the homes in the area.
We also made a trip to a place called Castle Farms.

Castle Farms is styled after midevel-style castles and although it is modernized, you can see the influence. There was a Fiber Arts Festival in progress at the facility which included all kinds of spinning related gear and supplies, a sheep herding dog demonstration, live entertainment, etc. The sheep herding dogs were something to see- those dogs are remarkable.

Castle Farms:



After our weekend trip to the Petosky area, we returned to Suttons Bay and the Wild Cherry resort.

We will now have to relax and recover from our KOA experience.