An anniversary afternoon ...

Eleven years ago, on a Thursday night nonetheless, Mr. Jones and I were married ... on the backyard deck of our pastor and friends, Doug and Donna Fagerstrom. While we were reciting our vows, an ice cream truck was driving through the neighborhood loudly playing the music to "Popeye the Sailorman" ... hmm ... less than romantic, but definitely humorous!

On the Saturday evening of our weekend honeymoon, we drove out to Grand Haven to eat a nice dinner at Bil Mar's on the lakefront. So since we both had separate plans last night (the actual day of our anniversary), we postponed celebrating until this afternoon. I talked Mr. Jones into driving out to Grand Haven for the afternoon for a repeat of our honeymoon dinner.
No outing with Mr. Jones is considered a good thing or the least bit successful without the presence somehow, somewhere of trains ... so, whew ... thank goodness for the Pere Marquette parked right here at Grand Haven! The parking lot next to the train is about as far east of the pier that you can possibly park. I was glad that it would give us a good opportunity for a nice long walk!
This place holds over 35 years of marvelous memories for me, and my first glimpse of the lighthouse, even from a distance, always thrills me ... I measure all other lighthouses against this one. I will admit that the light at St. Joe's is pretty beautiful, but still this one is extra special to me ...
It's very rare to actually get a photograph out here without hundreds of people in the picture. It's not that I mind people, but I would so much prefer a nice picture of the entire pier without one single person in it! I got lucky with the east tower here ...
It was a foggy, hazy, windy, humid kind of day out at Lake Michigan today ... my very favorite kind of afternoon!

I think someday I'd like to spend a whole week out here ... walking, listening to the birds and the waves and the fog horn that so beautifully sounded all afternoon today ... We had walked all the way almost back to the van when this lovely sailboat headed out to the lake. I wish we could have seen it pass by the lighthouse ~ would've made a beautiful picture ~ but I was way too tired (and hungry) to walk all the way back just to get the shot ...
We drove down to Bil-Mar's at about 3:40 only to find out they had no intention of opening the restaurant to anyone until 5:00! So we drove into town and had a yummy dinner at Rosebud's instead! All in all, a very nice anniversary celebration!