The Friday Five, 7/12/24: 5 things I've been up to this week
Apologies for no Friday Five last week—this will be more of a two-weeks' version of a Friday Five, as I was in Traverse City last week for my bachelorette trip, which was a lot of fun.
What I've been up to [these last two] weeks:
- Bachelorette trip to Traverse City. This was a lot of fun, and I'm glad we did three nights instead of two, because Traverse City has a ton to explore. The last time I went to the area was in 2019, with friends, and that was more of a winery trip; this time, we had some nondrinkers in our group so it was a mix of good food and wineries, plus the beach and some other stuff. I went with two other Detroit-area friends, so we drove the 4-4.5 hours there together, plus a Birthright friend from the Chicago area, who drove separately, and my future sister-in-law, who lives in the Indianapolis area, who also drove separately.
- Dining out. TC had a lot of great restaurants but my favorites were Stella, for Italian fine dining, which is located in what used to be a mental hospital (read about it that on Wiki; it's a pretty fascinating story, and the hospital closed in 1989); and The Little Fleet, a food trucks restaurant, and The Filling Station, for their s'mores pizza, which is unsurprising because those were my favorites in 2019 too.
For non-TC dining over the last week, we had Doordash from Taqueria San Juan, I believe it is, my favorite hole-in-the-wall in Waterford, and I also got Sonic takeout last night, which was pretty disappointing; I ordered the garlic bacon burger WITHOUT cheese and it came slathered in cheese, plus their drive-thru was kinda weird/complicated, so I won't be doing that again. I will say their pickle fries were good, though. - Touring wineries. We ended up hitting up five wineries, I believe: Rove, Brengman Brothers (upon suggestion from a Rove staff member), Leelanau (one of my favorites! See pic below), Mawby, and Shady Lane. Rove was close to our Airbnb, which was technically in Empire, MI, and had a great patio. Brengman Brothers was okay—would be fun for a wedding but because it was July 4th, they weren't offering wine tastings/flights. Leelanau was one I hit up in 2019 and it's one of the most gorgeous ones, IMO, as it's right on the Grand Traverse Bay. Tasting-wise we also had the most fun there, and made some friends. Mawby, for sparkling wine, was actually my least-favorite of the bunch; I got their "Sweet" flight and only found one of the three wines to be sweet-tasting. And finally, Shade Lane was super nice and woodsy, but unfortunately it started to rain when we were there, so we went inside.
- Hanging out with good friends. It was especially nice to see my Birthright friend, since I only get to see her about once a year (we usually meet up on the west side of the state), but we had a great group for the bachelorette trip. The Airbnb was also awesome; it was in Empire, MI, which was about a 20-minute drive from Traverse City, and because of the Cherry Festival madness that week, I'm kinda glad we weren't staying directly downtown (which is what I did in 2019, in a smaller Airbnb house). This house was HUGE, too—it had four rooms, each with a king bed, and one person took the couch, so we all had our own rooms. It also had a hot tub and a gigantic backyard, and most of the house was made with old wood beams, which was also very cool.
- Yellowcard + Third Eye Blind concert at Pine Knob. I did make a mistake—I thought this was a Yellowcard concert with Third Eye Blind as the opener, and I was wrong, it was flip-flopped—but it was still an enjoyable concert. I've only seen Yellowcard once, in 2006 at the House of Blues in Orlando, but it was a fabulous concert; I do wish they had played more of their old stuff at this concert, but "Ocean Avenue" was great, and we stayed until the very end to see "Jumper, "Semi-charmed Life," and a few other Third Eye Blind "classics," haha.
Leelanau Cellars, near Traverse City (no photo editing needed!) |