More of that huge lake (can't be a lake, really)

Fallasburg Covered Bridge, Fall River MI. Note the sign. I kept expected a little man to jump out of the bushes and fine someone $5.
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Arrived late, Roger (kiwi family friend) met me at the train station and it was pretty much time to crash. It was great to arrive to a package with some things sent over from Mum and my ex-workmates.

In the morning I met Lisa, Roger's wife who was sensibly asleep the night before, and the 3 of us went out in search of covered bridges. Apparently there are some in "The Bridges of Madison County" but I haven't seen nor read it. I just think they look cool and wanted to find out why they exist (FYI: to protect the bridge and prevent it from rotting.) So we saw a couple of those.

Grand Haven South Pier. COLD.
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After that we headed to a beach on the lakefront. I had already seen Lake Michigan in Chicago but this made me even more confused - here we have a body of water so big you can't see the other side, a sandy beach, wind coming off the water, small waves - must be the ocean!!! I never would've believed it except then I realised you can't smell salt. I guess the people who draw maps weren't lying to the world after all.

After some lunch we walked down a pier to a great lighthouse. It was soooo cold. There was some ice or snow or whatever still frozen out on the end. There are signs everywhere telling you not to go out there because in a storm the waves crash over it and a few people have drowned that way.

At the Nature Preserve
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But we got back alive and went to a Nature Preserve. I'm still enamoured with squirrels. They seem to mostly look after birds that have some type of injury or illness. That was nice and they also had a bobcat which grudgingly woke up to wander round and find another spot of sun.

For dinner we went to a seafood restaurant - we had checked prior to leaving that they had one chicken dish! It was really good and I got a gigantic fudge icecream for dessert (we managed to get the leftovers back home to the freezer!) Fudge is something of a Michigan specialty so it was a must-eat.

The next day Lisa was working, so Roger and I headed to the Frederik Meijer Gardens. Meijer is a local squillionaire who owns a supermarket chain. Anyway the gardens have a huge conservatory of butterflies. They were really beautiful. I was a bit jumpy when they got close to my face due to my stupid moth-phobia.

Outside there is a huge sculpture garden which has a wide variety of really stunning work.The highlight was a 24-foot bronze horse made from a Da Vinci design. Apparently there is an identical one in Milan so I'll have to see it one day.

After that we wandered around President Ford's burial place. I spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on emails etc, and we had roast lamb (and the rest of my icecream!) for dinner. I headed back to Chicago early the next morning.