Our last full day in Michigan; hard to believe we've been here for 11 days already!
Today we toured the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore which is located on the Leelanau Peninsula, northwest of Traverse City. The weather could not have been better today; blue skies, very light breeze, and temps in the low 70's.
Our first stop was in the town of Frankfurt where Joni and Wendy picked up some Petoskey Stone necklaces at a local craft fare. Thes stone contain fossils that are over 350 million years old. Wendy found another Petoskey Stone on the beach in front of Point Betsie lighthouse.
Our next stop was Point Betsie lighthouse which is the most photographed lighthouse in Michigan...clearly it deserves that distinction.
We then drove into the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, a beautiful area much like Cape Cod's National Seashore, except the dunes are even bigger with some cliffs over 400 feet in height! There were lots of tourists, which is understandable; it was a beautiful Saturday in the middle of July, but the crowds really didn't impact our enjoyment of the natural beauty of this area.
There were multiple viewing areas throughout the park where we able to look down from the tops of some of the dunes onto Lake Michigan and across to the two Manitou Islands which were according to Indian legend were originally sleeping bears.
This peninsula is also cover with cherry farms and wineries, but our focus today was on the National Lakeshore area. Leaving the park we stopped for lunch in the village of Glen Arbor and then continued up along the coastline to the charming village of Leland whose harbor is filled with charter fishing boats.
From Leland. We started our return to home base, traveling east through the very upscale town of Sutton's Bay, and then south along the eastern edge of this peninsula through Traverse City and eventually reaching our campground in Interlochen around 4 pm.
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