Fun in the hometown

PART ONE: BEAR CREEK

One of the best things to do is to find a place that is out of the ordinary and right in your backyard. Fortunately for us we are in a rare area that has many of these gems a few miles away.

First off we took advantage of a little hiking trail down the road from home at the Spirit of the Woods Club. It was a dreary day with the sky unable to make a decision between spitting and downpouring. However we took to the woods anyway. Thank goodness that we did too.

As soon as we got onto the trail we started to look for morel mushrooms, as the conditions were favorable, but stumbled upon a small field of the plant pictured above. They are Jack in the pulpits, a Michigan orchid, and very rare at that. I was so delighted to see them in the wild as it shows that we have not totally destroyed nature.

As the rain became steadier we kept under the canopy of the large hardwoods and examined the oddities that grow in the damp area of the bog between river bends.

The next few pics are a bit of a miny-study that I call Avatar:

 

Don't you just feel like you are running around with those blue things?

Anyway, as the rain let up we made our way out of the hardwoods and onto the banks of Bear Creek.

Fortunate does not even begin to describe how I feel about areas like this. Though the main hiking trail is not very long it sure does provide a nice area to take a small hike. The river is also a great place to catch various species of trout.

PART TWO: A FEW SHOTS OF PORTAGE POINT


To the East we have many trout streams and inland lakes, but it is to the West where you find my favorite attraction to this area: Lake Michigan. Its almond colored beaches and clear blue waters are constant reminders of why we need to protect what we have been given.

 On this day the sky was an unusually dark shade of blue, but beautiful nonetheless.

I do not really have too much to say about this beach that cannot be better summed up by pictures.

 

Please visit this remarkable place if you get an occasion, better yet, make it a priority to go see this place, or any place along the Lake Michigan shore.