I waited too long to book a hotel room for our return trip to Michigan to pick up the girls, and couldn't find one in the Muskegon area for less than $300/night. Jeremy advised me to look farther east of Lake Michigan to try to find something away from the prime tourist/vacation area. I used Google Maps and happened upon The Shack, which was about 35-40 miles from Blue Lake. When I called, they had a room with 1 king size bed left. (Poor Caeden has had more than his fair share of having to sleep on the floor when we travel, but would probably say he is "used to it.")
It was a pretty drive out "in the middle of nowhere" in the country to get to The Shack...
We weren't sure what to expect of a place called "The Shack" in "Jugville," Michigan...
But, we were actually pleasantly surprised from the moment we pulled in!
It is actually a Christian retreat, and all the buildings and signs are hand-crafted traditional Michigan log lodge style. The grounds are beautiful, with big porches and rocking chairs everywhere, and a beautiful lake.
Jeremy pulled under the awning of the office for check-in...
...and Caeden and I were greeted on our way in...
The main counter...check-in, etcetera...
Our room was in "The Livery."
This was inside the Livery entrance. (I feel like the atmosphere is so much nicer and more calming than any of the pictures suggest.)
The Sit-n-Room
And the log cabin feel of the hallway of rooms was so neat!
Our room was huge! Twice the size of any normal hotel room.
The tv was small--didn't bother us!
There was scripture and encouraging art and words around the room and the campus.
As soon as we put our things in the room, we drove into Fremont to get a few things at Walmart. The guys were both extremely disappointed that we arrived too late for them to go to the gym (after staffed hours, when there would be someone there to pay to get in.)
When we got back to The Shack, we went to dinner! It was an all-you-can-eat buffet that was included with the cost of our room.
Hungry guys!
The food was fantastic! My favorites were the pork roast, candied carrots, and bread pudding!
It was raining after we ate, so we didn't get to go out on the lake or walk around and enjoy the grounds. (I wanted to go in the paddle boat!)
Downstairs, below the eating area, we found billiards!
Jeremy and Caeden played for a while.
We went back to the room and the guys watched a little tv--Toy Story was ending, there was a Star Wars marathon coming on, the iconic scene from one of the Hobbit movies with the orc under the ice, a little bit of Home Improvement, and the Cubs were playing the Cards.
I just enjoyed the fireplace!!! Ahhhhh!!!!
Later, we went back to the dining hall, because they serve banana splits every night at 8:30!
(Also included with the price of the room.)
We weren't expecting much, maybe some soft serve vanilla and some chocolate syrup...But they had about 20 flavors of hard ice cream, and alllll the fixin's!
Choices, choices...
That is one happy man, there! ICE CREAM!!!
Orange pineapple, black cherry, and white chocolate raspberry!
We enjoyed our banana splits very much.
And while we ate, we learned that there are no buffalo on our continent. They are bison--with short horns and beards. We learned something new today!
We enjoyed the ambiance.
Looking out the window by our table, across the porch, to the lake...
We walked back to the Livery.
We now noticed the benches inside featured the banana split!
Jeremy and I filled up the huge hot tub and enjoyed it for a few minutes before going to bed.
What a lovely place! This was such an unexpected find and blessing when searching for a last minute hotel room...it was so much more! Wish we could've stayed longer.
Hope we can come back to The Shack sometime!
