Thursday, October 9, 2008

The plan was to stay in Munising until Friday the 10th, even though we had the whole weekend off, but as always, we simply couldn't stand the idea of leaving already. Unfortunately, the Sunset Motel didn't have any open rooms so we could stay longer, and if we wanted to stay in town, we were going to have to find another place to stay. So, we did. I made a reservation at the Superior Motel off the highway. Then we were ready to start the day!

To celebrate, we went shopping at the souvenir stores! Of course, we couldn't afford anything except a squashed penny at the Pictured Rocks Boat Tour gift shop, but we love our squashed pennies!

We also went to Christmas, where we visited the remaining gift shop in town and met a friendly shopkeeper and a fabulous dog named Max. Max is quite old, and though he's deaf and blind, he's still a charming lad who you can't help but love. He shares the shop with a cat named Peanut, who is unusually small for a full grown cat. Together I was highly entertained playing with the animals while B.E. talked with the shopkeeper about being forestry people. I can only listen to so many fish stories before I start to feel the need to fling myself on the floor and start kicking and screaming. After we visited all the gift stores around, we decided to attack some natural scenery for a while.

There are certain things I tried to save for the end of the trip, when the colors would be their most brilliant, and it was time to tackle those.

Munising Falls.

The parking lot for this waterfall is surrounded by sugar maples and apple trees, which, in the fall, make Boyfriend Extraordinaire and me very happy. Apples and colorful leaves -- what more could you ask for? Well, for me, perhaps, a banana tree is better, but I'll take apples.

Ooooh, color! And with a deep blue sky, they look even better!



Only a few trees in Illinois will turn this color, but in Michigan, it seems like half the trees look this pretty.


Red, orange and yellow. Everywhere.


And then we started down the path in the woods to the waterfall.

Which looked like this!






Munising Falls is gorgeous, with a forty foot drop. Once upon a time, B.E. and I climbed up behind the falls and it was only from close up that we were able to gauge the enormity of it. Sure, there are bigger waterfalls in the world, and probably many that have more water flowing over or whatever other traits there are that make a waterfall great, but Munising Falls is large enough to be impressive, and modest enough to be serene and approachable. And late in the day, the sun hits the canyon just right and turns the walls a peach color, striped with the minerals that give Pictured Rocks their name, and the peach limestone reflects off the water, giving the entire area a squash-colored glow.

However, on this day, we hit the falls when the sun was hidden by clouds. Still beautiful.


For more pictures of Munising Falls, click the image below to see my Tabblo page.

Something happens when we're in Michigan and there is an open expanse of grass. I think B.E. doesn't see much lawn in California because it's as if the grass invites him to take a nap. We call this The Flop. He will see a patch of grass and announce that he feels a flop coming on, and the next thing I know, he's down.


While he flopped, I took pictures of maple leaves.




When I was able to coax B.E. from his flop, we watched the sunset, had dinner, and called it an early night, our last night at the Sunset Motel. Sadness ensued, but we will return, and we still had another full day and a half in Munising to tackle!