Monday 31st July

After a super late night (most of us weren’t asleep until midnight) we woke up and headed down to the lake. We were meeting up with Trevor’s uncle who has lived here for 30 years and is our expert fishing guide.

One of Elliott’s wishes on this trip has been to go fishing. He mentioned it in Yellowstone and in Montana, it was either too expensive ($800 day trips out) or just not practical with licenses and permits. Today was the day! We couldn’t have asked for a better, kind and patient guide in Jeff.

Jeff explained that most lakes in Michigan have to provide public access. Due to how this development was constructed. This lake is private and is only used by the residents. This means that for a small fee every year the maintenance of the lake is taken care of along with exclusive use. Seems like a win win! Jeff noted that no engines are allowed on the lake. We are hitting the lake in Winnie’s (Jeff’s friend) peddle boat.

The excitement in Elliotts voice nearly made Daddy choke up “I’ve caught my first fish!” Daddy juggling between enjoying the moment and needing to document for the moment for everyone else, caught this clip.

As soon as Elliott pulled his first fish out, Oliver got his first fish! Beautiful sunfish the greens and yellows in the photo don’t do it justice.

The wind wasn’t in our favour, but that didn’t stop Elliott from pulling in another fish. This time a spiky fish that you need to handle care. Jeff told us not to touch it and he had to hold the fish very tight to get the hook out.

Daddy even had a go and caught the smallest fish on the trip. Final score: Oliver 3, Elliott 2 and Daddy 1 fish.

Once we hauled the boat out and cleaned it up we headed over to the smaller beach for some playtime. The boys loved having a go on the kids kayak and frisbee throwing.

Amazing dog tag team paddle boarding

Our wonderful hosts even let Mummy and Daddy out for an anniversary dinner. We headed to the local favourite of BlackRock (not the largest investment firm in the world). The specialty is steaks presented on volcanic stone, which you can then cook yourself to a preference.

It’s interesting having a 700 degree volcanic stone in front of you. It makes reaching for the salt or mayonnaise a life or death situation. Once the steaks were cooked getting rid of the stone made things a lot easier to enjoy.

The house speciality was a birthday volcano. If it’s your birthday a free $12 volcano filled with brownie, ice cream, cream and waffle cone is coming your way. Our server asked if we were celebrating a birthday, unfortunately not only an anniversary. He said, let’s just call it a birthday! And this thing arrived on our table.

We came back stuffed, and in agreement that the serving suggestion of 3/4 people for the volcano was accurate.