Sunday, October 18, 2009

24 Hours in Door County

So yeah, I have a lot to catch up on, including Sam and Nancy's wedding! But, that post will require a little more time, so for now, how about a quick peek into Mom and my 24-hour Door County trip?

I've never been to Door County, WI this time of year, and I was excited to be there in the fall with all of the leaves. And pretty they were! Mom and I didn't get up to Jacksonport until about 6 P.M. last night, and we saw that our hotel was doing a fish boil. Fish boils are a Door County tradition, or, as our cook called them, a tourist trap. :-) Our group consisted of mostly out-of-towners (or so it seemed) from Illinois and other parts of Wisconsin (from my analysis of parking-lot state license plates as we drove in). Even if it is a tourist trap, it's a fun tradition and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves.

We started with hor d'oeuvres, and then, right before the cooks took the fish, potatoes and onions out of the pot, they ushered us outside to watch and to hear the history of the fish boil.

To be honest, Mom and I were a little wary of trying the fish boil. Let's be honest, boiled fish doesn't really sound incredibly appetizing. But, we decided we wanted the full Door County experience, and actually, it was much better than we expected!

In order to get the pot to boil over, they threw some kerosene on the fire, and below is the result. Whoa!


Afterwards, as they took the giant pot back into the kitchen to serve the fish, we headed back inside. The dish came with Lake Michigan whitefish, baby red potatoes, onions (my favorite part! very tender and sweet), and steamed vegetables. For dessert, we had some Door County cherry pie a la mode. Definitely worth trying!



Today, we drove through Peninsula State Park, which winds around the coast of Lake Michigan. Mom and I decided to do a little photo shoot.



My mom is so pretty!




Doesn't this look like a nice place to read a book? :-)



We took some classic "throwing leaves" pictures. It might be cuter if we were two years old, but it was fun anyway!




On the way out of the park, we saw this gorgeous tree. I think bright red-orangy leaves are my favorite.




Happy fall, everyone!

4 comments:

Leslie said...

Oh man, I miss you guys! What a fun little trip! I love the throwing leaves photos! AWESOME! Thanks for sharing.

Unknown said...

that stump DOES look like it is begging a book break...

the reds are my favorites too. I can never decide which tree is the best because you always see another gorgeous one farther away when you are on a walk. too bad I can never get my camera to capture the vibrancy of the colors.

so you never said. Was the boiled fish itself any good? Did it just seem like fish stew?

Nancy K. said...

Lauren,
The leaf throwing pictures are my favorite!! Looks like you guys had a good time. We miss you! xoxo Nancy (and Sam)

Lauren said...

Elisa,

Yes, it actually was pretty good! We had to be super careful about bones, because they are tiny and sort of hard to eat around... but with some lemon and pepper, it was quite good! :-) Not something I'd necessarily eat everyday, but definitely pretty tasty!

And yes, I agree about the fall leaves. I always see a new tree I love more than the last! I wish I would have taken more fall pictures this year... this little trip was all I got, but there were lots of gorgeous leaves! I bet Ohio has plenty too!