I don’t get to see much of my BF for the next month as his weekends are spent entertaining the masses at the local Renaissance Festival. After that’s over, we are thinking about getting away for a couple days and came up with the idea of Mackinac Island, MI.
I looked around at places to stay and came across one of the most expensive rentals I’ve ever seen: Masco Cottege:
You gotta love the extra non-descript 19% added charge.
Anyways… we’re looking for some place considerably cheaper as one night there equals about 5 months rent for me. Any recommendations (should we even bother staying on the island or just ferry over for the day)? What to see/do/etc?
The thing that cracked me up about Mackinac Island was the massive mounds of horseshit lining the street right in front of the fudge shops with the big windows.
However I did find a terrific used book store.
We had a better time at Porcupine Mountain, on the UP, and with the parks on the north shore of WI.
If you have the time, and can afford it, I would highly encourage you to spend a night or two on the island. IMHO, the real fun begins when the last “fudge boat” leaves for the night.
There are cheaper places to stay, of course. Many of the smaller hotels in the village are reasonable, if not fancy. Or, for something really different, you could try this place: Mackinac Island Accommodations - Lakebluff Condos It’s well away from the village, very quiet at night, and has a beautiful view of the straits from a bluff. I’ve stayed there a couple of times, and I loved it.
Good luck, have fun, and bring money. Lot’s of it.
I’ve spent many long weekends on the Island, both with and without the kids. We’ve done Mackinac City also, taking the ferry over. As **Mayfield St. Cloud ** said, it gets really nice when the day-trippers are gone.
We’ve stayed at the Mission Point Resort, and the Hotel Iroquois. IIRC, neither of them will break the bank. I like the Iroquois, as it’s right on Main Street, at the far end. It’s next to a nice little park, and some rooms have a great water view.
It’s very, very cool to wake up in the morning to the sound of the horse carts delivering supplies and groceries to all the restaurants up and down main street.
I cringe to admit that having spent a large portion of my life within an easy afternoon drive of Mackinac Island, I’ve never been there. I want to go - I really do - but there’s so many other things that I want to do around here that don’t involve selling children or essential organs to pay for that I’ve just never gotten there.
If you end up deciding on something other than Mackinac Island, I can help you there. There’s a ton o’ stuff to do up here in the UP that is considerably more inexpensive and plenty fun. Just let me know what you like to do and I can give suggestions.
We had a friend who had a boat in Chicago that he would take up there. It was a wonderful way to go to a really lovely place. But that means I have no idea about hotels – we always stayed on the boat.
This weekend I am chartering a sailboat out of Madeline Island, so that has me thinking. Maybe you could look for a marina on Mackinac and see if you can charter a boat for the weekend that you won’t take out of the slip. If the Charter Master doesn’t have a charterer for that date, he might be willing to charter it out as a hotel room. It’s novel and cheaper than that place.
Just make sure you follow the paths well. We thought we’d take a short little walk on the coast of the island and started off going the long way around instead. That’s a long walk.
The Murray Hotel and the Iroquois Hotel are pretty reasonable, but you’ll really save money if you stay around Cheboygan. Mackinac City is about a 20-minute drive away, and you can hop on the ferry from there.
My favorite thing to do on the Island is to get a magazine from the adorable little library and sit on the back deck facing the lake. I hope you enjoy your stay there - it’s one of my favorite places in the world.
Whaty a coincidence. We were JUST at Mackinac Island this past weekend. I have a family of 6 (4 kids pluse Mrs. D. and myself), so cost was definately a factor. We stayed in a hotel in St. Ignace (In the U.P., just over the bridge) which was very reasonable. From there we ferried over to the island and spent the day there. Over all it was much cheaper than staying on the island itself. The only drawback to this strategy was that we had to watch the clock when it started getting late so that we didn’t miss the ferry back to St. Ignace.
It is not that hard to find hotels with reasonable rates. One thing to remember, however, is that they date to the 1890s and many of the rooms are strictly for sleeping. Beyond a bed and a bureau, they often have no furnishings and not much room. (Given the activities on the island, this is not really a problem, but it is nice to be forewarned.) The B&Bs often have more room, of course, at higher prices. Even the Grand Hotel’s less expensive rooms (none are inexpensive) are fairly tiny. If you’re on a budget, stay elsewhere and just visit the Grand for dinner or a stroll.
I paid a few extra bucks to get a room with a “view” of the lake, only to discover that the south-facing room soaked up sun and heat that it simply held all night long and the tiny room had no great view to begin with.
(Of course, it’s been 21 years since we visited; they might have refurnished all the rooms in the meantime.)
