QuickTurtle Books®

This year the Michigan Lighthouse Festival was held in Paradise, Michigan, and living not to distant from Hale, Michigan, this trip was dubbed the Hale to Paradise trip.  Paradise is about fifteen miles short of the shores of Lake Superior, where we were scheduled to have a vendor space at the Community Center for the Festival.

We worked diligently setting up our vending display to sell our books, IF I WERE A LIGHTHOUSE and BIG SHIPS.  Then immediately had to repack due to a wind and rain squall.  We made the best of it by deciding to visit the Crisp Point Lighthouse further on down the road beyond Tehquamenon Falls west of Paradise. Our trek led us down twenty miles of rutty, chatter bumpy dirt road, but the destination was a true paradise.

There we were greeted with much hospitality, a hot dog and stories from Rick the Proprietor.  We were graciously loaned a space in the lighthouse to set up our book display out of the wind and rain, where we spent the remainder of the afternoon.  There were many adventurous souls that braved the rutty road to visit and purchase copies of our books.  The Crisp Point Lighthouse Gift Shop is now a new home for IF I WERE A LIGHTHOUSE and BIG SHIPS..

We also had several of our other Michigan themed titles on display, including our new book THE SIREN OF MACKINAW, THE BLUE ICE OF MICHIGAN.

The next day we were once again greeted with a thunder storm and had to improvise our schedule away from the Festival.  We made an appointment to visit the Whitefish Point Light Station where we visited with the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum Store Manager, Sarah Jacques.  She requisitioned plentiful copies of our books and we sat and signed them for the Museum Store while another squall move in off Lake Superior from the West.

On our return to the Lower Peninsula we dropped in to see Katie at the  Michigan Lighthouse Museum Gift Shop to deliver more of our autographed books to their Gift Shop.  The lighthouse there sits with a spectacular view of the Mackinaw Bridge.

The trek from Hale to Paradise turned out to be much different than planned.  It was a wonderful improvisational adventure.  All ends well when you are willing to go with the flow and see where your journey might lead you.  

Richard Rensberry, Author at QuickTurtle Books®