Okoboji on steroids

We’ve been in Michigan for the last few days. Over the weekend we were in Benton Harbor for a wedding, then took a side trip to the Upper Peninsula to visit famed vacation getaway Mackinac Island.

Mackinac (pronounced “Mackinaw”), which sits seven miles out in Lake Huron, is reachable only by a 20-minute ferry ride from the mainland or small airplane. No motor vehicles are allowed on the island (except for a few emergency vehicles). Cops ride bikes. You either walk, bike or ride the many horse-drawn carriages that leave piles of poop on the streets of the quaint village. A crew of pooper scoopers clean up the smelly piles throughout the day.

Mackinac Island is Okoboji on steroids, crowded with fudge and souvenir shops, restaurants, hotels, and summer homes.

The big attraction is the Grand Hotel, a mammoth wooden structure built in 1887 by some 600 workers in just 93 days, without the help of power tools. The 388 guest rooms, no two of which are alike, start at more than $1,000 per night. If you’re not a registered guest you must pay $14 just to enter the place that has been the location of several movies. We did not stay there, opting for reasonably priced mainland lodging.

But Mackinac got plenty of our money anyway. The round trip ferry ride (which runs every half hour) was $40, plus another $46 for a horsedrawn tour with 20 others in a carriage pulled by a pair of humongous Belgian draft horses. You can rent a bike for $18 per hour. Or just walk.

Everything on the island is hauled by horses, who are given frequent rest breaks and days off. They’re cared for by five veterinarians plus staff, while humans have to share a single doctor.

Mackinac is one of Michigan’s biggest tourist attractions, attracting thousands every day during the summer. About half the state’s residents — as well as throngs from elsewhere in the U.S. and around the world — seemed to be there the same day we were.

The island shuts down over winter. The hotels and shops close, the multi-million dollar private homes sit empty and the island is turned over to the 500 permanent residents who keep the gears turning until spring. The only visitors are the deer who wander across the frozen lake from the mainland in the dregs of winter.

WE THEN swung over the top of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and headed down the west coast of Lake Michigan to Champion, a tiny settlement a few miles east of Green Bay.

That’s where the Blessed Virgin Mary is said to have appeared three times to Adele Brice, a young Belgian immigrant woman, on her way to Mass in October 1859. Mary told the 28-year-old Brice to teach children about salvation. Brice built a school and devoted her life to this work.

In 2010, after years of investigations, the Catholic Church declared these apparitions were real. Several medical miracles have also been attributed to Brice, putting her on the path to possible sainthood.

The National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion, which was built on the site of the apparitions, attracts pilgrims from around the world, although not in numbers like Lourdes or Fatima. A couple tour buses and a half dozen cars were there during our visit. Brice is buried next to the shrine. It is the only apparition site in the United States certified by the Catholic Church.