Honeymoon Journey, Day 1

We left on our honeymoon early Saturday morning, September 4th, and headed north until we reached Cheboygan, Michigan. It's a quiet little resort town, located about a half hour south of Mackinac City. OK, for those of you who are NOT from Michigan, it's pronounced Mac-in-NAW, not Mac-in-NAC! Once we got to Cheboygan, we checked into the Continental Inn, where we discovered that our honeymoon suite was a one-bedroom loft overlooking the pool! It was physically seperate from the rest of the motel, with its own private entrance. The front desk even offered to turn off the phones for us, to insure absolute privacy! Hubba Hubba Baby!!

Waiting for us in the bedroom was a basket of fruit and a bottle of white zinfandel wine (coincidentally Angie's favorite,) chilling on ice!

Wine and fruit waiting to be enjoyed!

The people at the Continental Inn went out of their way to make us welcome and comfortable (not that they saw much of us!) They even referred to us as "the newlyweds!" Should you have an opportunity to travel to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, avoid the tourist traps on the way and give them a try. They are located at 613 N. Main Street, Cheboygan, MI. Reservations are available at 213-627-7164.

After unpacking and settling in for a bit, we started to think about the things we wanted to do while we were here. OTHER THEN THAT!! By making a few phone calls, we found out that Soo Lock tour boats are running until the early evening and it's only about an hour from the Mackinac Bridge, also called Big Mac (long before McDonald's ever thought about putting "two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce and cheese in a sesame seed bun!") The locks tour was something that we both really wanted to do, so we piled back into the car and headed even farther north. Once we got there, fate had smiled upon us. Two openings had become available on the last dinner cruise throught the locks for the day, which was sold out when we called. Next thing we know, we are chowing with a couple from Michigan City, Indiana and heading east into Canada!

The tour was pretty cool. There are actually 5 different locks located between the two cities known as Sault Ste. Maire (pronounced Soo-Saint-Marie,) 4 American and 1 Canadian.

The first lock on our tour.

The locks are designed to control the movement of ships between the North Channel of Lake Huron and Lake Superior, which is 21 feet higher. It is also one of the last stops in the St. Lawrence Seaway for ships heading west from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. The locks are open year round, except for a two-month maintenance closing from January 15th to March 15th.

History Lesson: The locks have been open in various forms for over 300 years, beginning with two canoe locks built by the Northwest Fur Company.

The tour, which was scheduled for about two hours, actually ran closer to three and went through two different locks, including the Canadian lock! Not bad for our first day out!

Click below to continue with us on our journey around Lake Michigan!