Foreign Students & Authentic International Food without the Airline ticket...

Many of you know how many Foreign Students come to the island every year from all over the world to work as part of the J-1 cultural exchange visa and this year the Kelleys Island Welcome Center will present the 1st Annual Foreign Students' International Food Festival, currently set for August 25.

Each group of students will represent their country and serve up their favorite recipes with the help of their local sponsor. There will be 3 categories including appetizer, main course and dessert, judged on presentation and taste.

The group winning "best of show" will receive a cash prize. Afterward, there will be an auction for the best recipe. The winner of the bidding, open to the local restaurants, will receive the right to include the "prize recipe" for one full season on their menu.

Several of the countries represented will be Russia, Bonia, Romania. Come support the students and enjoy great food from their homelands without leaving the country

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What is 50' long with running water, downtown Kelleys Island?

Next time you pass by the old-fashioned mini-golf, which is located in Caddy Shack Square, downtown on Division St. (locally referred to as "Envision" Street) for those not familiar, get out and take a walk to the middle of the course and you will discover that Kelleys Island now has a waterfall. With the help of our local artist and gardener, Joe Corso, we have reinacted the old waterfall.

Once active, it has been dormant and weed covered lately. After many attempts to plant flowers to beautify the shady strip of ground that was once a waterfall/pond, this year Caddy Shack Square has rebuilt the fall.

Joe worked endless hours manually digging out the dirt-filled bed, laid a pond liner, recemented the leaky stone fall structure, planted flowers and added a pump and soaker system for the flower bed. Rumors are, there will be fish too! This should add a nice touch to the already charming old fashioned mini-golf for kids and family to enjoy.

Kelleys Island, for your family vacation, a holiday resort island - local and fun!

What is Green, Red, White
and blinking all over?

The only bulb illuminated sign on Kelleys Island, just got refurbished. It has been in much needed repair for some time now, every year it had lost a light or two and last year someone hit the sign for the second time, so it was a bit bent up. It was a collaborative effort...

Steve Petri repaired the metal structure, Joe Joyce redid the wiring and Sandusky Electric worked on the blinking system that has been on the "blink" for some time. Joe Corso is redoing some of the letters by adding (in red) "Home of Buckeye Bar" in the center of the 2 sided sign.

It was re-erected last week with several on-lookers and a sigh of relief after it finally rested perfectly on it's perch.

Many thanks to the new Caddy Shack Restaurant & Bar owners, Phil, Brett & Lynn, and Wayne & Debbie and everyone involved, the historical icon is back and looking good!

New Welcome Center, Downtown

This year, downtown lost the Chamber to the Seaway Marina, so all the travelers looking for information after getting off the Jet Express Ferry or the Goodtime I Cruise Boat downtown, were left to their own resources. So the Caddy Shack Square had a brainstorm and decided to implement a Welcome Center - "Welcome to Kelleys Island, Ohio - Information & Souvenirs" (souvenirs to pay for the space and the free information). There are many features for travelers and local businesses with focus on directing visitors both on the island and on the internet. The Welcome Center is a free service for the businesses to drop their information for visitors to gobble up, so bring your flyers, brochures, calendar of events etc. and look for Alfredo de la Fuente's emails for updates or request for info verification, or email him at: kelleysislandconcierge@gmail.com for more information

As businesses on Kelleys, we are all different and draw our own customers. We are here to direct people and help them find the experience they are searching for. Businesses, if you want to boost your exposure locally or online, talk to Alfredo about becoming a sponsor to help keep the center alive and your business on top.

Alfredo is working with internet marketing and search engine optimization, for those of you not so internet savy, he is helping Kelleys Island to become one of the top spots to show up when doing an internet search for what we have to offer here.

Ordinarily, when you build a website, it takes around 2 years to be searchable (in the organic search located on the left side of the page) by terms other than your website name. With various search engine tools, you can speed that time up and increase your exposure, it is way over my head, involving blogs, forums, search words, structuring your site to be searchable and a lot of time, but that is the general idea, and that is what Alfredo is good at doing.

Feel free to stop in and check it out, open 10:30 am - 6 pm, everyday starting next week June 9. Ph. 419-746-2808