A Traverse City Celebration: Part One

I knew my husband was cooking something up for our first wedding anniversary. What tipped me off? His  random, "You don't know what I'm planning," or "What day of the week is the 21st?" comments, followed by abrupt silence and little elaboration after I answered the questions. No, my husband is not a good liar, but I think what really tipped me off was when we were sitting in our living room watching TV last week, and I saw that he was looking up hotel rates on his laptop—with the screen turned right towards my face. I asked him what he was doing, which prompted him to turn the computer about two inches in the other direction, but his lack of Bond skills were pretty much a giveaway. Took him about another half hour before he asked me if I'd like to go to Traverse City to celebrate our anniversary weekend.

Um, yes. Not the most stunning reveal, but I was still very excited about the trip. Plus, he did manage to surprise me with one more little detail: we were going to be riding around in a Chevy Camaro convertible for the weekend. I guess being married to an engineer really does have its perks.

We set out Saturday morning for northern Michigan. So far, this was the farthest we'd traveled to visit a new Michigan town, but after making several nine- to 11-hour drives over the past couple weeks, this mini road trip was a breeze. Not to mention, we did attract quite a lot of positive and envious attention while in our borrowed stud-mobile.

We arrived in Traverse City just as everyone else was finishing breakfast, and didn't waste any time looking for something to do. A handy, little app I downloaded for the occasion told us that downtown was the place to be, so we listened—and off we went.

In addition to hosting loads of cute, cherry-themed shops and tons of delicious restaurant options, Traverse City's downtown area is conveniently located just off a main lake shore road. After picking up some cherry-chocolate coffee (free when you check in on Foursquare!) and cherry root beer from Cherry Republic, we shopped for souvenirs, then grabbed lunch at the Green House Cafe. Then, it was on to the beach, where everyone and their mothers seemed to be spending the afternoon. Boats, bikes and beach bums galore—truly a beach town in a format I've never seen before (much different than the ocean-side, east coast beaches I'm used to).

When Saturday afternoon rolled around, we took a drive through the beautiful countryside on the Old Mission Peninsula. The area was filled with vineyards and scenic views galore, so we just had to get out of the car for a few photo opps.

Apparently, my husband and I stumbled upon Old Mission during its well-known Blossom Days festival, a weekend where people from all over come out for wine tasting at each of the peninsula's seven wineries. We only visited a couple of them, but ended up taking some souvenir bottles and a logo glass back with us as mementos of the day.

Of course, we couldn't call it an afternoon without seeing the rest of the peninsula, so we drove to the Mission Point Lighthouse, which is located on the 45th parallel (or, the halfway-point between the equator and the north pole). Awesome. I've always wondered what halfway-to-Santa looks like, and now I know.

The view was gorgeous, but the sun was hot and the gnats were in full swarm. Still, we had fun hopping from rock to rock on the semi-swamped beach and getting sucked into the spongy sand/mud. Okay, that last part wasn't actually fun, but overall, the place was very beautiful.

Sunburned and exhausted from hours in the 89-degree heat, we headed back to Traverse City to rest and clean up for dinner. Deciding we were in the mood for steak and seafood (and going off of a recommendation), we went to Boone's Long Lake Inn, where the food was great, but the service and loud atmosphere were a bit off-putting. Okay, the loudness came from of a kids' soccer team, which I can understand, but our waitress kind of went MIA. Good thing another server came and helped us out, but I still think my husband left our original waitress more of a tip than he should have. He's much nicer than I am.

After dinner, we went downtown for some window shopping and ice cream. A beautiful evening in a place where every local seems to know one another—that's a lovely picture of summertime. And that's Traverse City.

But wait! There's a whole 'nother day of Traverse City exploring on the horizon...which I will recap for you in my next post, coming soon to a Patch blog near you (psst—that means here).

Talk to you soon!