I think, as American’s, we’ve lost the art of vacationing. Most of us fill every second of our vacation days with activities, many of which include getting to the airport hours early just to sit and entertain ourselves eating cinnamon rolls and pursuing a book or several newspapers in the gift shops.
Once we finally reach our destination, after a long travel day, we fall exhausted into strange beds and try to sleep on pillows that go flat, an air conditioner that runs constantly and a plethora of other people’s children running up and down the halls when they should be fast asleep followed by party goers arriving really late in the evening forgetting entirely that people are trying to sleep and that no one is interested in what they think is funny, at the top of their voices, at two in the morning.
This last vacation of ours was different, very different.
A television program about appealing parts of Wisconsin featured a striking mature woman with stunning short white hair and blue glasses, talking about the business she conducted on Washington Island.
A quick internet search and, sure enough, Wisconsin does have a Washington Island and it’s at the very tip of Wisconsin’s thumb, attainable only by ferry.
It wasn’t the island that was so attractive, but the fact that this woman, Martine, grew lavender, an abundance of lavender and she not only had rows and rows of plants on their twenty one acre farm slated for harvest in mid-July, but she had cleverly created a seating area in concentric circles of lavender, alternating a white row with a purple row for sitting and photographing. And there was a gift shop and bistro!
Now to find someone to go with that had the time. Not my husband because he does not like the smell of lavender, and summer is his busy time.
This is why God gives you a daughter; and if you’re really blessed, He gives your daughter a daughter too.
So far, so good: a rented car, beautiful weather, pleasant company and money to splurge.
Lodging was sparse at our final destination, so by throwing a dart against a map, a spot was picked, reservations made. And this is where the wheels came off.
The information said the lodging was a resort and it was right on the water. It did not mention that there would also be thousands of mosquitoes due to more rain than usual, and the beach was reedy and a haven for those little flying bugs that everyone wonders why Noah didn’t swat when he had the opportunity.
But, ignorance is bliss and we were on our way. The towns got smaller as we reached the tip of Door County, noting that every business, large or small, or out in the middle of nowhere, advertised free wine tasting. Evidently, the person in charge of the original roadwork had sampled each site because as you approached the very tip of the county where the ferry awaited, the road became a zig-zag for the last mile, swinging way to the left and then way to the right.
A sign at the dock informed you that you were about to cross Death’s Door where hundreds of ships had sunk and many people had died crossing the treacherous waters between the peninsula and the island. This was not good news, but then neither was the thought of maneuvering a rented car onto the tightly packed ferry.
Safely aboard, we should have learned something from the upper deck where we stood looking down on our fellow passengers; many of whom had fly swatters and bug spray in their back window.
The island itself is small, maybe four miles by six miles, much of it trees. A giant Swedish coffee pot greets visitors inviting everyone to sit and relax. The town was small and very old, as was our destination resort.
Established in 1902, the Sunset Resort was truly authentic and to be there was like stepping back in time, way back.
Our room was generous, the beds comfortable and the staff was very friendly. The downstairs consisted of a large dining area, a windowed porch lined with comfortable chairs, windows, binoculars, books, and games. There was a cozy living room to one side that held the television, which got only cable, the room no one ever used, by choice.
The recycle bins we saw both upstairs and downstairs were for glass, plastic, aluminum, paper and other, were repeated all throughout the town in every public building. With all the visitors the island desperately needs to recycle everything, sending much of it to the mainland.
The internet was non-existent, as the three members of the Discover Wisconsin crew found out when one of the photographers plunked down his laptop and phone on a dining room table and found out; so much for keeping in touch with the mother ship in Madison.
We buzzed into ‘town’ to eat supper and buy bug spray.
Most of the restaurants were bars with food, and the one we chose advertised fresh lawyers on the menu. Evidently, they’re named after the slimy bottom-feeders of the legal world, their words, not mine.
When the owner recommended the catch of the day, she wasn’t kidding. The only fish served were what their fishermen caught that day. Our choice was a white fish dinner with green beans and red potatoes, perch or corkscrew shrimp with fries.
We ordered the white fish and the shrimp and ate dim sum (food in the middle of the table and eat as much of whatever you wanted) everything was delicious.
It took us only seconds to fall asleep after returning to the resort and sprinting in ahead of the mosquitoes to our room that was surrounded by the total quiet of the woods and water and by breakfast time we were ready for our one full-day on the island.
There were less than a dozen rooms at the resort, but the window-lined dining area was filled to the brim by eight o’clock. Come to find out, the local folks, many of them business owners themselves, drove over for breakfast, as they did most days.
The menu was ala carte and everything was home made. Cherries featured heavily in the Icelandic crepes. Evidently one of the original owners married a woman from Iceland and she brought the recipe with her and they’ve been serving it ever since. Two Icelandic crepes came wrapped around a softened cream cheese filling and the finished result was covered in a warm cherry sauce.
It was tempting to have another cup of their island coffee, but it was time to head out to visit a few stores and then be at the lavender farm when it opened at ten o’clock.
We’d buzzed by the Fragrant Isle the night before just to find it and being a devotee of anything lavender, I was anxious to get there. Once there though, it was hard to decide whether to start inside at the bistro and gift shop or outside was the rows and rows of lavender.
The gift shop won out and it was like stepping into a shop in France with its intoxicating fragrance, its old-world display shelves painted in the ubiquitous French off white, the interspersed green of faux arborvitaes and freshly picked lavender everywhere. The color lavender was continued in the packaging, the ribbons on the woven shopping baskets and the bouquets of dried lavender on display everywhere which were for sale.
Lavender scones, lavender cake, tarts, and lavender everything and they were all meltingly delicious, especially when eaten with the velvety French coffee and the lavender-infused tea.
Next was the stroll through the gardens, along with an ever growing crowd who had taken one of the tour trolleys from the landing and had only a short time to see and eat it all.
Back at the resort that night, already our last night, we were a smaller group and where we had gone to bed early the night before, this night was spent in the dining room drinking tea and visiting with the large family that were the fifth generation to own the resort. Their girls, similar in age to my granddaughter, asked if she would like to help take the flags down at dusk.
It was a semi-solemn affair with each of the side flags down first and folded properly, followed by the US flag on the tallest pole that received the same reference. The previous family owner, who, with her husband, still had a room at the resort, told us that there were seventy-four flags and if requested, they would fly your homeland’s flag for the duration of your stay.
As the extended family gathered, the girls asked my granddaughter if she would like to join them in playing games, and they played for several hours. If their friendliness was any indication, I would say that the sixth generation will also do well as owners.
During the evening as we visited with the family, we were told that the lavender farm was started only four years ago with a retail store followed by the planting of 9,000 lavender plants. Soon it grew to having more retail space, offices, drying, production, storage, shipping and e-commerce fulfillments and even more plants. Martine was indeed French, growing up in southern France and had an impressive resume of owning several businesses both in France and the U.S.
Her husband Edgar had an extensive background in International Development and led McDonald’s corporation’s global construction for twenty years. They retired with money and were investing some of it in order to make Martine’s dream come true.
Since I bought one of the books at the shop that featured Provence, I knew that I needed a signature from this lovely woman. It changed our plans for the next day making our departure later, seeing we were originally going to get an early start for home. But my kind-hearted daughter said we’d just amuse ourselves until the Fragrant Isle opened and changed our plans. The Discover Wisconsin crew was there early too trying to film before the crowds arrived. The resulting program slated to be shown on January 13, 2018.
Martine signed my book; we took a photo, bought more stuff and left with such happy memories of our day and a half in Washington Island, where the pedal bikers, the moped riders and the residents lived in a country-peace side by side.
The last thing we did at the Sunset was to inscribe a rock and leave it in our room as a door stop. This was somewhat of a custom with rocks everywhere inscribed with names and dates and sentiments, kind of like the precursor of an internet review.
We arrived home well rested and as women, dove into our homes with renewed energy instead of needing a vacation after our vacation.
It’s a shame there aren’t more resorts, more old-fashioned vacations that don’t leave one exhausted and cranky and travel worn.
I’m just saying.
Last Update: Jul 29, 2017 7:47 am CDT
