A wonderful weekend "Up North"

If you live in Michigan, the phrase "up north" means a lot more than just "stuff in a northerly direction."  It is a lifestyle in the summer full of boats, lakes, rivers, campfires, beer, cards, and questionable personal hygiene.  Think Kid Rock's All Summer Long, but minus the confederate flag bikinis and Alabama/Werewolves of London rips, and you have "Up North".

Well, after almost a whole summer in Michigan, Taylor and I had still not managed to make it Up North.  Between him traveling Monday through Thursday and Nashville having puppy class every Saturday, we were booked through the end of July.  But on August 3, Taylor completed his internship (with a job offer, yay!) and we hit the road almost immediately, with pup in tow.

The first right of passage was Up North traffic.  Being a typical northeasterner, Taylor immediately likened it to "Jersey Shore Traffic."  Luckily, Michigan just can't muster the pure terror and sheer volume of traffic that the New York Metropolitan area can, so the traffic really only delayed us by 15-20 minutes (Ha!).

We made great time and arrived Up North at around 9:30pm just in time to meet my parents and our good friends Carole and Randy at Elk Rapids' Harbor Days.  I expected this to be a water-based festival of some sort, and was promised beer.  What we got was a hot, inland beer tent with Busch light only.  The saving grace was that the cover band, The Bronk Bros, was actually really good.  I was the DD, so I didn't drink much and we headed  to our cabin about 30 miles away around 11:30.  My parents and Carole and Randy actually headed back then, too, but they had taken the boat to the festival and actually ended up taking almost 3 hours to get back to the cabin.  So we had time to get settled with the dog and nod off to sleep before they came back around 2:30am.

After a short night sleep, we woke up early to the morning light causing Nashville noticing the caribou and deer hanging all around our cabin.  He began FREAKING OUT as he realized he was being watched by a variety of wild animals, but have no fear, mom was able to save him from the caribou by placing a blanket over his crate so he couldn't see them (magic!).

We got up and Taylor and I decided to go play tennis and take Nashville for a swim in Lake Charlevoix, which is right down the street from our cabin.  We found a nice isolated corner of the beach where Nash could chase the tennis ball in crystal clear water.  After that, we played tennis for about an hour until my parents called to have us come meet them all for breakfast.

After breakfast, Carole and Randy packed up to head out and mom, dad, Taylor and I headed out for a beautiful day on the lakes of Northern Michigan.  We put in in Lake Bellaire, then took the boat through the beautiful Grass River, which is a very shallow river with grass reeds and small houses dotting it.  You have to go very slow because it is so shallow, so it's very relaxing.

After the Grass River, we arrived in Torch Lake, which is one of the most beautiful freshwater lakes in Michigan.  It's water are crystal blue, primarily because it is so deep (250+ ft) and has a sandy, rather than a muddy, bottom.  Here's Taylor and I in the water: 

We spent some time on Torch Lake until the weather headed south, then we went back to where we put in via the Grass River.  I napped on the front of the boat the whole way back.  After we took the boat out, we headed to the town of Bellaire, where we were delighted to learn was the site of Short's Brewering Company's Brewpub.  We had some delicious beer and sandwiches before heading back to the cabin in East Jordan for a campfire (complete with S'mores!)!

On Sunday, my parents were heading back down to Ohio, so Taylor and I made plans to go to the Sleeping Bear Dunes and the Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore, a beautiful part of Northern Michigan that we had both heard a lot about but hadn't gotten to see.  Basically, there are acres and acres of beautiful sand dunes plunging into Lake Michigan and the water of the lake is shallow, warm, and crystal blue.  I was lucky enough to find a pet-friendly room at The Homestead, a beautiful "Freshwater Resort" on Sleeping Bear.

After helping my parents pack up at the cabin, we headed to sleeping bears and went straight to the visitor center.  Their top recommendations were the Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive and the Dune Climb, so we headed out to do both immediately.

The Scenic Drive had 10 or so pullouts and areas where you could see nice views of the dunes and surrounding areas.  Here are some highlights:

Nash and I overlooking Glen Lake, a beautiful blue lake:

We did a 1.5 mile hike on the Cottonwood Trail:

Nash and Taylor ran up a little dune, here they are victorious:

And tired...

The next stop was this place where a dune plunges 400 feet at a very steep degree into Lake Michigan:

Nash checking out the view:


Those little dots are people climbing back up, that's how big it is!

Family Photo Op!

Then we went to the dune climb.  It looks like just a little sand hill, but when you get up close, the .25 mile, 137 foot ascent is KILLER!  I only made it 1/3 of the way.  Taylor made it about halfway.

After all of our fun dune exploration, we we checked in at the hotel, which was so beautiful!  We made dinner reservations at the fancy Italian restaurant at the resort and decided to catch the sunset before going to dinner.  The resort sits on the east shore of Lake Michigan and therefore has beautiful sunset views.  We also had a bottle of the white wine we bought for our wedding and we drank it while watching the beautiful sight:

Pup at sunset:

Our fellow onlookers:

We had a fantastic dinner complete with wine and desert before heading back to our room.  The pup was quite tired:

The next morning, we got up bright and early and played tennis at the beautiful clay courts overlooking Lake Michigan:

After tennis, we took the pup to the beach so he could swim in Lake Michigan: 

It was his first experience with waves...

Finally, we cleaned up and grabbed lunch at the lakeside cafe, where I also snapped this great photo of the resort pool which overlooks the lake as well.

Lunch spot: