Thursday-Sunday, July 26-29th, 2007
Silver Lake State Park isn’t in a town. It’s not really near anything except Lake Michigan. It’s in a township and the closest established town is about 4 or 5 miles away. But there are plenty of businesses that have built up around the park. Gas stations, restaurants, souvenir shops, dune buggy rental, ATV rental, Jeep rental all that sort of stuff.
Oh you mean dune buggy, ATV and Jeep rentals aren’t common around a state park? They are here! Check out this picture taken from the campground.
That’s 2,000 acres of sand dunes. The dunes area of the park takes up about 2/3 of the 3000 acres that comprise the entire park. The dunes are divided into 3 segments. The northernmost area is designated for off road activities, the middle area is for walking or hiking and the southernmost area is leased to Mac Wood’s Dune Rides which has been offering dune rides in their vehicles since 1930.
We stayed at the state park campground for 3 nights This park is so busy and so full all summer long that when I made the reservations back in May the only way I could get 3 consecutive nights at the campground was to book 3 different sites. We had to move each day. It wasn’t so bad tho, I had a tent for the kids and myself, and my parents have a truck camper so moving was a minimal distraction. We got really good at it by the 3rd day. The sites were all on the same part of the campground, so I’d simply pick up the fully pitched tent and carry it down to the next site. Then I’d load the outside top of the car trunk with the sleeping bags, sleeping pads, pillows and camp chairs and drive it down there. The kids took care of moving the 5 bicycles and my parents tossed all the loose items in the back of the camper, cranked up the stabilizers and went for a quick cruise. If anything, it eliminated a lot of camp clutter so that when it was time to come home we were outta there in a flash.
We did the normal camp stuff: biking, swimming in Silver Lake, relaxing around a campfire and souvenir shopping. Silver Lake is a lake that is separated from Lake Michigan only by the immense dunes. If you look at a map of the area you’ll see that Silver Lake itself is actually pretty small.
On Friday we made a trip to the pedestrian area of the dunes. This is not what you would call easy walking. The sand shifts and the dunes are high in some places but you do get rewarded with great views. Plus you can sit and watch the off road vehicles come over what is called Exit Hill…for the very reason that it’s the last hill before the exit. Simple enough.
As is natural for dunes, they are in constant motion. Each year a little more forest and a little more of Silver Lake is swallowed up slowly by sand. Here are some pictures of trees near the pedestrian area.
It’s a pretty amazing place to visit. If you like the natural dunes then the pedestrian area offers you tons of hiking options. If you want to go blasting over the sand dunes in your 4 wheel drive then you’ll have a great time as well.
We also went to the Little Sable Lighthouse and you can read about that here.
AND the highlight of the week (for me and the kids at least) a 3 hour Jeep rental so we could hit the dunes! Read about that here.
