Open the Door...

This past weekend Toni & I went up to Door County, Wisconsin for a much needed change of scenery/break from the monotony. Toni started the 5+ hour drive and got us just north of Milwaukee where I took over the driving for the remainder of the trip up to Bailey's Harbor. We stayed at a small motel/inn on the Lake Michigan side of the peninsula (the other side faces Green Bay). Our room had a beautiful lake view. We just sat on our bed and enjoyed the view for about an hour.

Across the street from the inn was a small local bar, The Blue Ox, which was decorated with miscellaneous antiques from the mid-19th century through the early 20th century-- including 2 antique barber chairs, a couple of old Edison gramaphones, and even a mounted deer head with Mardi Gras beads strewn through its antlers. As is with normal with bar/pub fare-- the burgers were greasy and absolutely delicious. After dinner we went for a walk up and down Rte. 57 checking out the shops, confectioners, and etc. The one location which happened to catch my eye was a gourmet popcorn place which had a sign on the side of the building indicating the entrance to the dental office was around the back-- now that's what I call 1-stop shopping!

The next morning we drove over to Sister Bay (on the Green Bay side) for breakfast. After breakfast we walked over to a small park and realized it was the very park where we'd watched the sunset on our last visit back on Memorial Day weekend 2004.

Door County is known for their cherries, so no visit is complete without a trip to one of the many cherry farms/wineries. We picked up a few bottles of cherry wine and a jar of Cherry salsa before continuing on to Egg Harbor where we had to (especially given Toni's nationality) stop at the British Store. I picked up a 4 pack of Tetley's Beer for myself and we picked up a pint glass and a couple of bottles of some of the more obscure beers as a Father's Day gift for my father-in-law.

After our brief shopping excursion we headed to Peninsula State Park, rented a few bicycles, and cycled to the Eagle Bluff lighthouse located in the park to take a few pictures. Given that it was a good 20-30 degrees hotter on the Green Bay side than on the Lake Michigan side of the peninsula (about 90 compared to the low-mid 60s on the Lake)-- we'd worked up quite a sweat, but decided to go to the Cana Island Lighthouse before returning to our hotel. Due to the drastic difference in temperatures, Cana Island and the causeway between the island and mainland were enveloped in a thick rolling blanket of fog-- but we did manage to get some really cool pictures as a result.

We returned to our room for dinner (we'd brought cheese, crackers, pitas, hummus, wine, and I'd picked up some summer sausage) and then drove over to Egg Harbor to watch the sunset.

On our trip home yesterday we drove threw some seriously heavy rain. We had to pull over twice (once on I-94 and once on Finley Rd.) and turn our hazards on as the rain was so heavy that not even our wipers going at full speed were doing anything to help our visibility. As is normal with storms of that intensity-- the rain passed quickly.

Because the weather had been so hot in our absence and the A.C. had been off all weekend, Toni & I returned to a greenhouse.

All in all, it was a thoroughly enjoyable trip, the only thing we didn't enjoy was that the time had passed far too quickly-- but isn't that the way it always goes with these three day weekends?