Day 8 - Friday June 17 2016

Weather:  68 degrees, sunny.  We slept in, had breakfast, loaded up and started the treasure hunt (some lighthouses are like geo-caching - you really have to search).  We found 3 lighthouses in Muskegon (Muskegon South Pierhead and Breakwater lighthouses and a third with green/white stripes).  We lucked out and also saw the ferry coming in from Milwaukee to Muskegon and got a pic of one lighthouse and ferry).  Out next lighthouse was in Grand Haven (Pier Inner and Outer).  We found the lighthouses marking the inlet from Lake Michigan into Grand River.  It was a beautiful area with 2 red lighthouses.  We moved on and headed to Holland, MI, a city that is heavy with Dutch influence.  Debbie Buckley - US-31 had 2 of your favorite eateries side by side (Culvers and Jimmy Johns).  We were going too fast to get a pic for you.  We did some shopping on 8th Ave and Central Ave had lunch get at at Irish Pub (what happened to Dutch restaurants?) called The Curragh.  We left downtown and backtracked to DeKlomp wooden shoe factory and watched a demonstration of how the wooden shoes are made on lathes over 80 years old.  Next door was Veldheer's tulip farm - not any bulbs right now - spring is over.  They do get their bulbs from the Netherlands and Gwen and Patsy picked up a catalog for next year.  Full of knowledge about why Dutch wear wooden shoes, we headed south on US-31/I-196 toward South Bend, IN where we unpacked one more time after visiting Notre Dame campus and eating dinner.  A funny story from dinner: when we got out of the car at Olive Garden, we were laughing at how trashy David and Gwen's van had become - if anyone ever looked in they would think we were homeless and living out of the van.  We went in to eat.   David had a set of keys plus I had a set of keys in my back pocket.  Sometime during dinner (probably me) I moved in my chair and opened the rear hatch of the van.  What a surprise when we came out of Olive Garden and the van's rear hatch was wide open for the whole world to see how trashy inside the van was.  Luckily no one stole anything as iPads, cameras, luggage was all sitting there for the taking.