Marblehead Lighthouse
Marblehead Lighthouse is one of Lake Erie's best known and most-photographed landmarks. Built in 1821, the Marblehead Lighthouse is still standing strong as the oldest lighthouse in continuous operation on all of the Great Lakes.
We didn’t climb to the top as we had no cash, its $3, we did visit the museum which is in the old light keepers’ house adjacent to the park and spent an hour walking around the park and the rocks.. The whole area is nicely organized and well kept, and the lighthouse is managed by the Marblehead lighthouse Historical Society a non-profit organization formed to establish a museum for the preservation of the history of this unique village
Kellys Island
After we cleaned up the camper and did a load of washing we headed over to Kelleys island via the ferry from Lakeside Town, the round-trip cost $144, not cheap though it did include our jeep. The kids thought it was super fun driving the jeep on the boat and then sitting there till we got to the island. Kelleys Island is a quieter residential island where it seems the only businesses are local, As of the 2010 census, the island's population was 312.
Plenty of place to eat and drink and shop but its all small scale, which is very refreshing.
We hired a gold cart and drove around the island, takes about an hour. Richard gave both kids cart driving lessons in a car park which was fun. The island has a long history of limestone excavation and fishing which is still in operation today, though far more sustainable than in the past.
Most interesting feature was the exposed glacial grooves showing how the Canadian glaciers from the last ice age have formed the great lakes and left these small islands exposed, fascinating!
South Bass Island and Sandusky
This is the party island and far busier than Kelleys island, we caught the ferry over to Put-in-Bay and took the jeep again, it was kind of redundant as there must be 1000 golf carts on the island, I think there may be an over supply issue! The island is much more geared to water activities, so we took the opportunity to take out a jet ski and then did some kayaking in the bay. I don’t know why it’s called Put-in-bay, but I can imagine some sailor in the 1800’s just saying it a good place to put-in and it got repeated and hence that was its name.
There are several wineries on the island and a couple of brewing outfits, lots of restaurants and a busy marina and shopping district. I have never seen as many golf carts on the roads as on this island, you have to see it to believe it!
On our last day in Ohio, we went down to Sandusky to see the tall ships festival. It is the towns bicentennial and they have a series of celebrations through the summer, they had a 91 foot yellow duck – I fail to see the relationship between a tall ships festival and a plastic duck but lots of locals seemed rather excited about it. Clearly, not everything is bigger in Texas. We then wrapped it up with an afternoon at Cedar Park waterpark, super expensive though the kids had fun and we all cooled off
