Day #3 - Monday, September 21st, 2009

What a difference a day makes! Marissa rose about 6:30 to let Zoe outside to do her thing and found it was raining steadily. (According to the locals, this was the first rain in 22 days, so the ground needed it, although we didn't). Marissa climbed back into bed and proceeded to sleep solidly for another two hours. John meanwhile drank coffee and did assorted computer stuff, getting fairly well caught up.

Once we were up we headed to the Breakfast Room and found that this motel has a first class breakfast bar with a variety of hot food and the full range of cold foods also. They also had very nice coffee, so we indulged mightily.

At mid-morning it stopped actually precipitating so we decided to chance an excursion. We headed into town, first to the Visitor's Center, then a gas station for another 3/4 tank plus a bag of ice for the coolers, into which we have hardly delved at all so far. We went to Munising Falls, access to which is just a short walk, and John showed Marissa where it used to be possible to creep around behind the falls, now forbidden due to rock falls. Just as we had walked back to the van it began to rain, lightly but steadily again. We cruised on to the end of that road, but didn't disembark, just looked through the gloom and headed back.

We decided that Painted Rocks would be no fun in chancy weather, so stayed local taking another short hike, this time with umbrellas raised (how English!) to see the very pretty Wagner Falls. The rain was still coming and going, although mostly the latter so we gently returned to town & bought pasties at the shop that had been sold out yesterday. We then took the main road past the motel and towards Marquette until we came to the area where a series of Rest Areas are right by the shorline. We chose the second one we came to, moved in to the back of the van and lunched on the excellent pasties.

By the time we were done the rain really had stopped, for the moment, so we plowed down to the water line where Zoe had a ball, leaping about along the sand, running in circles and once again doing battle with Lake Superior. When we judged that she was wet enough and cold enough to not mind leaving we staggered up to the van and headed to the motel. First order of business was for Marissa to give Zoe a warm bath, mostly to remove two days-worth of sand & dirt. After that we did what Holidays are meant for - lay down and snoozed at length! By the time we had roused ourselves, and gone to the lounge for a "cuppa tea" the rain was well over, the clouds were leaving & by late afternoon the sun was shining.

We had lucked into one of the few premium parking spots up close, so we did some clothes sorting ready for tomorrow, and also brought a good selection of our picnic stuff in a thermal bag (we do have both refrigerator and microwave in the room) as we intended to laze away the rest of the day and eat in our room. Later we suffered through a picnic dinner - Italian bread, French Brie, Italian salami, cold shrimp & sauce, salads, cubed cheese, honeydew melon & brownies. It was yummy! Some time after that we made up for our lack of exercise by swimming, and relaxing in the spa, comfortably warm but not yet up to "hot" after being fixed today.

Our small mileage wasn't worth individually recording, but the day proved the wisdom of our having built in some contingency time. The next few days look to be lovely.

To look at Marissa's picture blog look here.