A trip north to the in-laws was in the cards for us last weekend. They live about 25 minutes southwest of Traverse City in an area filled with beautiful forests, lakes, hills, and trails. Alas, I didn’t spend much time enjoying the great outdoors, but Andrea and I made a trip into Traverse City to enjoy some of the city’s wonderful ambience.
The highlight of our brief trip was Amical, Andrea’s favorite restaurant. And, I suppose, mine too. They have one of the best appetizers ever, olive twists. On previous trips, I have gone to Amical just for the olive twists – they are worth a their own trip.
Our oh-so-brief stay included a visit to Jacques Torres, a chocolatier located conveniently next to Amical. We got a box of a dozen chocolates and some chocolate-covered Cheerios. No, I had never heard of them either. The chocolate chip cookies looked great, and I’m planning on having one on my next trip.
The last stop downtown was to the Traverse City visitor’s center on Union Street. Even though I have all the magazines and brochures I need about the area, I still like to stop. You never know what new and exciting things have popped up since the last visit. And it has a public bathroom – you can’t put a price on that.
As an aside, I visited one time and one of the volunteers working at the visitor’s center asked if I was the maestro. I don’t have any nicknames, so I said that no, I wasn’t the maestro. He took me around the corner and showed me a life-size cardboard cutout of… me. It was actually the conductor of the Traverse City Symphony Orchestra, Kevin Rhodes, but we look oddly similar.
As we were leaving town, we stopped at the Meijer to pick up a “Best of” Nick Jr. DVD for my daughter (I had remembered the portable DVD player, but forgot the DVDs, which doesn’t do a lot of good), though she ended up not needing them. The 3+ hour car rides went surprisingly well, with no meltdowns. This was due, in a big way, to Andrea’s purchase of Laura Berkner CDs. Elena really seems to like those. Anything to make the car ride easier is okay with me.