Happy 4th of July!

We are back up in Michigan finding new trails to hike and revisiting some favorites. Our first hike was to Hartwick Pines State Park. We have visited this park many times, but on this day we explored a new trail to us, the Ausable River Trail. It crosses the east branch of the Ausable River twice in it’s 3 mile loop. Two things notable on this hike were the tall ferns and the absence of wild life. I saw only one bird and besides that the only other animal we saw was another puppy hiking with its human family, the only other group we encountered on this trail. With the 4th just around the corner I expected to cross paths with more people. After finishing our hike on this trail we visited two small fishing lakes, Glory and Bright Lakes, that are just to the west of the state park’s main entrance. A sign at the start of the trail leading to the lakes states, “These remnants of the Ice Age are 37 and 47 feet deep. As the Wisconsinan Glacier retreated northward across Michigan more than ten thousand years ago, large blocks of ice were deposited in the outwash material left behind. These detached blocks of ice melted in place to form kettle lakes…The lakes are home today to bass, perch, sucker, bluegill and trout.” We visited with a family from down state who were camping at Hartwick this week. We haven’t camped for many years and it was interesting to learn how very difficult it is to secure a reservation for a site.

Hartwick Pines State Park, located in Graying, MI, is one of the largest state parks in the Lower Peninsula. The park features 49 acres of old-growth pine forest, 21 miles of trails, a logging museum and a very nice visitor center and a modern campground. We are so fortunate to have so many interesting recreation areas within a short drive.

After hiking we stopped at Northbound Outfitters on our way out of town and we treated ourselves to a food truck lunch. This was convenient since we had Teddy with us. We enjoyed being able to sit outside and have a place that we could take Teddy since it’s getting too warm to leave him behind in the car. All the new smells and sounds kept him very distracted and made it easy for us to enjoy our lunch. He had several first this day, after our day exploring upon returning home G. successfully coaxed him into the lake for his first swim. He has embraced lake life this week.

Our second day of hiking allowed us to stay very close to home. We heading to the Cross Country Ski Headquarters to hike their ski trails, an area we have visited several times before. There’s a little bit of up and down terrain, areas that are in the open and other trails that traverse through thick woods. Being created for skiing as opposed to simply walking, the trails are much wider than the trails we typically find in other parks. While on this hike we heard and spotted much more wildlife. Turkeys called in the distance, several species of birds flew from branch to branch overhead in the tree canopy, and I was able to snap a photo of a black squirrel. Black squirrels are a very common sight up here, unlike in Indiana. They are so very pretty, this picture really doesn’t do it justice. I’ll try to catch a better shot on a future hike.

We had saved the best hike of the week for last, but the morning of that planned adventure Teddy was under the weather and so we decided not to take our road trip after all. I look forward to going and being able to share about that hiking adventure soon. It is one of my favorite locations in Michigan. Teddy had found and ate one, maybe two green pinecones, so we think that had his insides upset but it was short lived and he was back to his ornery/salty dog self in no time.