Our Grand Adventure - Lake Huron

Living all my life in Utah, I have not had many opportunities to spend time on the water, but ever since we took our big family trip back east, I have been fascinated by the Great Lakes. My first glimpse of Lake Michigan is something I will never forget; one of those moments that literally takes your breath away... and the kids just loved swimming in the warm water without salt.

So when we decided to take our trip together this year, and Canada became the destination, one of the things I wanted to do the most was to see more of these beautiful lakes. Our little resort is not far from Lake Huron, but an early snowstorm made it difficult to do what I had planned. I was hoping to take a ferry ride out to Christian Island on Monday, but the snow kept us in town. On Tuesday, I was determined that we would get out and see the lake. 

We climbed in the car and set the destination, but it kept winding us around these little Concession roads. My sweetie saw a sign that said Tiny beaches, so we decided to make our way there. As we drove between quaint houses on a snow-covered road, we realized that Tiny was the name of the town. After a few minutes of twists and turns, we finally turned a corner a caught our first glimpse of Lake Huron. 

It was not quite as life-changing as Lake Michigan, but amazingly beautiful nonetheless. I knew when we left Utah that we would not be able to frolic on the beach in November, but I had hoped to at least be able to touch the water. The angry waves that bit into the snowy banks kept us safely inside our toasty vehicle as we admired the seemingly endless water. Lake Huron deserved its own blog post.

 

The GPS reminded us that we still had Christian Island on our radar, so we followed the promptings until we were sitting in our car at the ferry landing. It wasn't there, but should be returning in about half an hour to make yet another trip to the island. We only hesitated for a moment before we decided not to wait for it to return. The waves were still angry and the snow had begun falling in earnest. We only had about 4 inches on the ground (or should I say 8 cm), but we had other places to go and things to see. 

My sweetie punched in the address for Captain Ken's Diner, a place that was famous for authentic Canadian fare. We were not disappointed with the service or the experience, but we didn't really love all of the food. Poutine was provided free of charge by our excellent server although after a couple of tries each, she laughed at us and took it away...fries covered in cheese curds and brown gravy was not our thing. I ordered pickerel which was a fish that sort of tasted like our trout in Utah, but I shared it with my sweetie when he was completely disappointed with the fish chowder. (I think he was expecting it to taste more like clam chowder.)

Back at the hotel, we spent the evening swimming and hanging out in the outdoor hot tub, playing games in the arcade (I actually beat my sweetie at pool!), and meeting some new and interesting friends.  On Wednesday, we head into Toronto for a couple of days. That will definitely be different from the way we are spending our days out here in the countryside.