UP Adventures

Yikes, where did June go? Life got super busy, this kept getting pushed to my back burner, and now I'm madly scrambling to keep our streak of two posts a month alive. 

The humans recently took a whirlwind roadtrip to Michigan's Upper Peninsula, so this is basically going to be a photo dump with minimal explanations. It's kind of cheating, I know, but I plan to come back and flush it out when we finally have some downtime this holiday weekend.

Day 1: evening drive to the top of the lower peninsula 

Christmas tree farm

Mom's bed for the first night

Day 2: St. Ignace and Marquette

the rental by the light of day

the car rental facility was all out of SUVs, so their chariot was this rental Jeep Wrangler

Wawatam Lighthouse in St. Ignace

It may look picturesque, but there were clouds of mosquitos and gnats that killed the mood.

Quillwork masterpieces on display in the Museum of Ojibwa Culture

Jingle Dress

sampling of the sculpture garden outside the museum

Lake Michigan views

they knew they were in the UP now

the view from Mt. Marquette

Presque Isle Harbor Lighthouse

they enjoyed skipping rocks, building cairns, and (in Mom's case) just enjoying the wide variety of pretty rocks

the view from the top of Sugarloaf Mountain 

It was worth the hike!

Marquette Harbor Lighthouse

Mom's bed in Marquette. Sketchy hotel, but she slept great!

Day 3: Heading West

Ontonagon Lighthouse

the views were shrouded in mist

they toured the inside, which was restored to look like it would've in its heyday

On to the Porcupine Mountains!

First stop: the visitors' center, where they saw the only bears of the trip: two stuffed ones. 

so much forest!

The Lake of the Clouds

this trail ended in a tower to climb

360 degrees of green and blue beauty from the top

Manabezho Falls

They kept heading west after that to Ironwood.

great food, classiest port-a-potty Mom has ever been in

the world's tallest Native American statue, the 52-foot Hiawatha

On the way back east to Marquette, to the same sketchy hotel, they tried to stop at 3 different waterfalls. They couldn't find Root Beer Falls, the trail to second falls was closed, and they almost gave up on finding the third, Bond Falls

they persevered and made it to Bond Falls before sundown

Day 4: Going Up

Squaw Beach

the Jeep after the rough ride up Mt. Arvon

at the very top of Michigan!

no road noise from here, that's for sure!

They then journeyed up the Keweenaw Peninsula.

Sand Point Lighthouse in Baraga

aptly named: lots of sand

Eagle Harbor Lighthouse

The children's bedroom area in the lighthouse included these. =)

a tranquil Lake Superior

they drove in and out of lots of rain on their way back south

they stayed in a much more upscale hotel room on their final night in Manistique

Day 4: Kitch-iti-kipi, Petoskey, and home

first look at the eerily green waters of Kitch-iti-kipi

they got to observe it from this floating platform

swirling sand and meandering fish 

Mom's overpriced but irresistible souvenir =)

Goodbye, UP

One last stop to refuel. A+ on the decor, Culver's!

Riding in Style

Star Stable is eager to launch into summer. Their Summer Daze Festival is already kicking off tomorrow, June 3. Before we get to all that, let's recap the end of May! Summer's great and all, but we're in no rush to leave spring behind. 

Speaking of things left behind, one evening recently, Mom arrived home, went to pull her car into the garage, and discovered this:

Despite the scariness of the garage door opening and a car rolling by, he/she did not move from this very exposed, uncomfortable spot in the landscaping rocks. Why did the mother think this was an okay spot to leave her fawn for hours? No idea. The fawn was still there when Mom checked later, but he/she was gone by morning. We hope that means the mother came back, and all is well! 

Nothing this cute has come up in Star Stable recently, but we did enjoy the debut of Style Riders Week. These two fashionistas, Daphne and Simone, hosted it out in the grassy expanse between the Pony Championship and Fort Pinta.

We neglected to take a screenshot of our official entry on Day 1: Fae Kingdom. Oops.

We'd already lost our elf ears by the time we took this screenshot, but other than that, this is what Clara and Star looked like. XD

On Day 2: Legendary Hero, we did our best to dress up Clara and Snowy as the Lone Ranger and Silver.

We were dedicated enough to buy the mask and shirt for the occasion. Not sure if we'll ever use the mask again, but the shirt's cute enough for regular-life wear.

Day 3: Magical World of Witches, was probably the easiest sub-theme, since we already had witch gear from Halloween. The hardest part was deciding on a horse. As you can see, we went with Garnet in the end.

Many players dressed like the Marchenghast witches or used the other newer witch sets, so at least Clara looked unique. 

On Day 4: The Villain of the Story, we didn't have any great inspiration so just dressed Clara like a pirate and paired that with our "scariest" horse, Kitekey. 

We weren't the only ones with the pirate idea, but we were - in our opinion - one of the better-dressed ones. XD

We made it into the top 15 in our group with all 4 entries. Good job, everybody!

Here is our entry for the finals, the Druids sub-theme:

Clara and Honey tried their best!

If all that wasn't exciting enough, another horse bazaar set up shop in Moorland this week as well!

From left to right: Solas and Dorcha, the Appaloosa, and the Irish Cob

Solas's bay pinto non-magical form

Dorcha's non-magical black pinto form

These guys are really cool, and apparently they haven't been available to purchase in over 3 years. We prefer our non-magical Irish Cob, Panda, however, so we are not especially tempted.

We are all set on the Appaloosa front too (love you, Evie!), but if we were ever to get another, it would be this one:

Whew, I'm relieved we're unanimously passing on this bazaar. Star still has a ways to go with her training. 

More Star Stable news to come soon, since Summer Daze is going to last 5 whole weeks and will no doubt be quite entertaining. 

The last thing I wanted to talk about: Mom's Breyer collection! Mom received two new riders and an Arabian horse on her birthday this year. She also had some other new, unopened horses and riders from Christmas and even gift-receiving occasions before that! It was well past time to free them from those yellow boxes.

What better way to celebrate than a ride out in the backyard?!

Some of the reins are still wonky from being all folded up in the box, and the English saddles' stirrups are too small and short to be practical for the riders. Other than that, we're loving all of it!

Now to come up with names for everybody. Oof.

After the ride, the horses had some time to roam the backyard on their own before heading to the basement to meet everybody else. <3

Aw, Breyer horses of all sizes are so beautiful! We're the biggest fans of the 1:12 scale ones like these: they take up less space and are less expensive than traditional 1:9 scale ones without being quite as fragile as the even smaller ones. It's also great that they are the same scale as Mom's Grand Champions so that they can share the tack and riders. =)

Until next time!