Anniversary Weekend

Yeesh! I can’t believe it took me this long to write about our anniversary weekend in Door County. I got back into my regular routine pretty quickly: work ten hours, come home, walk Ari and/or take him to the dog park, do the dishes, and make dinner, at which point all I want to do is plop down on the couch with a plate of food and a glass of wine. Dave remembers when I used to post three times a day, but I think he forgets I was only working 28 hours a week at that point–writing a blog takes time, my friends!

Anywho, we started our journey last Friday morning. I dropped off Ari at the pet sitter’s house and then proceeded to cry the whole way home. I know, I’m weird. It would have been different if he was staying with friends or family, but for all I knew, this lady made dog fur coats or threw them in a ring and made them fight with each other and the ten (!!!) birds she has in an aviary.

How could I do that to this face?! Fortunately, Dave was sympathetic and didn’t tell me I was stupid; he just told me Ari would be fine. I knew the kitties would be fine because our friends Dan and Em took care of them while we were gone. And thus we started our journey by car.

I abhor car rides: I get nauseous, restless, dizzy, the whole nine yards, so I distracted myself by taking pictures.

After two hours, we made it to Sturgeon Bay, and I asked Dave if we could stop at a cafe for some lunch to break up our ride. Google served me well in finding Bluefront Cafe.

It was cute and cozy inside with a fantastic menu and really friendly waitstaff. Because it was a chilly day, I started with tea, and I was impressed to see that they actually had loose leaf tea in tea bags.

Hit the spot.

I ordered the Maple Street Grilled Cheese Sandwich with a cup of their soup of the day: curried lentil.

I cannot stress how amazing this grilled cheese sandwich was: 2 year cheddar, baby swiss, roasted red pepper, and mustard on grilled country sourdough bread. It was the best grilled cheese I’ve ever eaten, and I can’t wait to recreate it at home. The curried lentil soup was also amazing.

Dave ordered the Bluefront Organic Burger which was served on a ciabatta roll with housemade fries, which tasted like they battered just like fish before they were fried. So good.

We thought it was another hour to the cabin in Egg Harbor, but it ended up being only about 30 minutes away, so we made it just after check-in time. Perfect!

I opened the cabin door to a personalized sigh: Welcome to the Treehouse, Chelsea Leahy! Such a nice touch. The cabin was modern and comfortable with a beautiful view.

The bedroom was perfect with a soft king-sized bed and huge closets that nearly made me weep. I really miss having a decent closet!

After we settled in for a bit, we drove into town and checked out a few of the shops.

I loved this British Import store. We picked up a bag of haggis chips and some delicious orange curd which we deemed perfect for biscuits and scones. I also found a pair of Chelsea football socks that I had to have.

After a brief olive oil tasting at Fat Louie’s, we decided to come back the next day for some olive oil and balsamic and walked to Shipwrecked for a brew.

Nearly every beer, wine, and mixed drink on the menu was locally sourced from Door County, which I thought was neat. I started with a tasty pumpkin ale, but the bartender cringed when I ordered a Fat Louie’s Martini.

The Fat Louie’s Martini was made with balsamic, vodka, pureed strawberries, lime, and black pepper, but she said most people couldn’t drink it because they thought it tasted like salad dressing. Dave and I thought it would be good to order with a side salad, but I opted for the Snowbird Sour instead, which was made with Door County Whisky, cherry bluff infusion, orange marmalade, and sour soda, and I thought it was something my brother would have ordered.

We thought about ordering dinner there but decided we wanted to relax in our cabin, so we drove to the local market instead for supplies.

We took a turn down libation lane for some gin.

We ended up walking out with frozen pizza, dolmas, reuben bites, and ice cream. Dinner of champions. We turned in early, and after a sleep punctuated by nightmares, I woke up early to read my book in the jacuzzi bath.

Note to self: a jacuzzi bathtub is not like a regular bathtub. I lost a huge chunk of hair when one of the jets sucked it off my head. Ouch!

After Dave woke up, we enjoyed our morning coffee while watching a John Wayne movie, then hit the road for some antiquing and wine, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and cheese tasting.

This giant thumb may have been my favorite antique. Because who doesn’t want a thumb statue in their house?

The tapas place I wanted to go to wasn’t open for lunch, so we walked down the street to The Bistro.

We had to wait a little, but it was cold and rainy, and neither of us (well, mostly me), wanted to venture out again before something warm. I ordered the crab burger with french fries, which was pretty bland and tasted more like tuna than crab.

I also made the mistake of having a cup of orange spice tea, which I thought would taste like my mom’s delicious cinnamon orange spice tea, but instead tasted like I was drinking a cup of red hots. Blech.

Fortunately, the cheese tasting saved my palate.

Cheese makes me very happy.

So does bread.

We only went to two wine tastings, both of which were packed with people, which made for kind of a hectic experience for those of us who don’t like large groups of people. Hello, claustrophobia! Thankfully, wine helps with that.

After a stop at Grandma Tommy’s country store (which Dave and I nicknamed “Tranny Granny’s” and he didn’t think I should post on the blog because then people would know how strange and creepy we are sometimes), we decided to go back to the cabin, get in our PJ’ss, and have a European dinner night.

We enjoyed bleu, trappist monk, and irish cheddar cheese, sunflower flax and country french breads, broccoli and hummus, and sausage while we watched Pride and Prejudice and Galaxy Quest. We packed up lots of leftovers for snacking on the rest of the weekend, and went to bed at 9:30. Old fogeys.

The next morning we were aimless: we got in the car and drove to the tip of the peninsula, and even though it was another cold and windy day, the views were lovely.

We made our way to the Cana Island Lighthouse and paid to walk the grounds but elected not to pay the extra money to walk up to the top.

We drove back to Egg Harbor to try a pizza place we’d been recommended by a few people, but when we heard there was a two hour wait, we decided to try our luck elsewhere. Casey’s looked good, a barbecue and smokehouse place, but really we were craving pizza, so we took our pictures with the pig and headed out again.

I found out that one of the Mexican places in town had pizza, and our day was saved with margaritas! Thank you, Mojo Rosa’s.

There were only a few people in the place, and we finally felt comfortable. At my coworker Jessica’s suggestion, we ordered the nachos to start, which were awesome.

We then ordered the Chipotle Meatball pizza which came with chipotle salsa, meatballs, black olives, onions, and was topped with fresh cilantro.

It was such a unique and fantastic combination. We were so full from the nachos that we ended up taking more than half the pizza back with us. After relaxing for a few hours back at the cabin, we decided to head down the street to the Log Den for a cocktail but got sidetracked by some beautiful horses on the way.

Hello, horses! When I’m rich and retire on a big, beautiful ranch, you will become my pet.

After our beverages at the Log Den, we spent our final night at the cabin with a multitude of delicious leftovers. It was another relatively early night for us, and we woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed the next morning, eager to get back home to our pets. Because of our poor luck, Monday was the first truly gorgeous fall day, but at least it gave us a pleasant drive back home to our kitties and turkey butt.

It was a much-needed vacation, and I’m glad Dave and I got to spend so much wonderful time together! We both decided that Door County was a little too touristy for us, but it was undeniably beautiful, and we really liked the cabin we stayed in. Our next vacation may not be for awhile, so I’m glad we finally got a trip away from it all.