Vacation
Well, we’re home from a week of vacation up north in Michigan’s Leelanau peninsula. It was beautiful. The weather we perfect and the colors were glorious. The whole experience included far too much food, far too little sleep, and the perfect amount of wine.We stayed in a cabin RIGHT ON the Traverse bay. It was beautiful:
The view was perfect:
Just up the road we often saw turkey…indeed, this was a small flock!
Here’s some more pics from the trip (including a few from the Willow Vineyard - not our favorite - and one of a really cool house):
I got some knitting done too, but haven’t taken pictures of it all - I promise I will though!
Finally, here’s a list of the wineries we visited (in no particular order):
Without question, my favorite vineyard was Shady Lanes — they’re awesome. Great wine, beautiful view, wonderful people. We’ll go back there. Left Foot Charley and Gills were great too. Gills is fairly young with INCREDIBLE potential; so is Left Foot Charlie (their room is one of the newest attempts to recapture and rejuvenate the old campus of Michigan’s now-defunct state hospital). All in all, we were impressed by some wonderful Rieslings and some great Cabernet Francs. I’ve never been a fan of the cabs but Michigan is apparently a wonderful place to grow them! (We liked others too, but I’ll stop there, for now.)
Also without question our universally LEAST favorite was Raftshol winery. I’ll not go into detail, but I will say we didn’t enjoy anything about it.
Oh, and for you tea-toters (how does one spell that?!), remember, we were up there a week and didn’t do all the tasting at the same time! 
Finally, if you get a chance to try the biscotti from Provisions Ltd. DO SO. They’re wonderful. The only problem is that if you can’t find them somewhere (they’re available at the Longview and Black Star wineries) you have to pay unbelievably high shipping fees. 
Anyhow… That’s all for now. Maybe more later. Grace and Peace,
`tim
4 Responses to “Vacation”
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October 27th, 2007 at 6:36 pm
Looks like a lovely area. I’ve only travelled the UP (aside from stops at the Detroit airport, which don’t really count). Here in Maine, it’s very common to see wild turkeys out along the Turnpike. I think they’re beautiful birds.
October 27th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
Oh, and I don’t think I had noticed that you went to Central. I studied in Spain through their program 20 years ago next spring.
October 27th, 2007 at 8:41 pm
Yep… I’m a central grad. I didn’t actually go on any of the overseas programs, although many of my friends did. I was an exchange student in high school - it was that experience that basically choose central for me.
As for the turkeys — I think they’re cool. We have them around here too (SW Michigan) although I’ve never seen a group as big as one of them we saw last week; it was AT LEAST 20.. probably almost 30. Unbelievable!
I have to admit I’m not a fan of the Detroit airport. A friend of mine, and I spent a night there on the way back from a meeting a few years ago. Sure it’s a nice NW hub, but it gets incredibly cold at night and everything seems to close down at about 8:00. I don’t recommend it!
Welcome to my blog. Hope to see you more!
Grace and Peace,
`tim
October 28th, 2007 at 5:41 pm
I enjoyed your fall pictures and your wine commentary. How is everything in Dunningville?