Still on Mackinac

 Today Trish and I had a beautiful sunny day walking all around Mackinac Island.  Being a Monday, there were fewer day-trip people here and that made our walk even more pleasant.  We went up the the Grand Hotel. (Just before leaving home we had watched “Somewhere in Time,” because it was filmed here.)

The Grand Hotel is so huge and certainly represents the preservation of something from another era. 

Of course, being here, you are in fudge country.  There are easily more than a dozen different fudge makers just on Main Street, and most of them have additional marketing outlets.  There are always samples to be had…this is the way purchases are tempted.  We tasted our share, bought some, and spent a long time watching and meeting some of the fudge makers.  It was a nice diversion.

We learned that while the summer population is around 900, the year round population is only about 600.  This made us wonder how the several large churches on the island manage to survive.  Then we started seeing the “have your wedding here” signs outside them and got our answer.  Being originally a French fur trading headquarters, the earliest religion here was Roman Catholic.  The beautiful St. Anne’s Church is the present embodiment of that history.