Ways to Beat Michigan's September Heat

We are very impressed with the long list of things we have found to entertain us in western Michigan. Every location has had good kayaking with a wide assortment of rivers and lakes. Every location has offered some hiking through forests and sand dunes. But our third form of exercise entertainment--biking--really shines here in Michigan. We have found extensive rail-to-trails projects where old railroad tracks are converted to nice level biking trails. Because they are forecasting record-breaking heat for this late in September, we left early in the morning to check out the Hart-Montague trail.

From the trail-head parking lot it was 22 miles to the end of the trail in Montague, Michigan. With the heat we're not quite that ambitious. Who are we kidding, we're not ever that ambitious since the round-trip is 44 miles. So we're opting for the trip to Shelby, and the return ride for 16 miles total.

On this unseasonably warm day, we especially appreciated the shade from the trees that enveloped parts of the trail.

We are in the middle of apple country, and harvest is in full swing. As we biked past this apple orchard, we see the big wooden crates stacked up in the orchard. That's the way apples are transported to the warehouses in this area.

We love biking through agricultural areas, where we can see the crops up-close and at a slower speed. The soy bean fields are showing signs of yellow as they get closer to their harvest season.

We also pedaled by this mystery crop. Even Mark, using his best googling skills can't figure out what this crop is.

At first we thought it was a field of weeds. But it is obviously planted in rows. It is wispy and we don't see evidence of any grain or fruit attached. We are stumped!

We did make it all the way to the town of Shelby, where signs along the bike path lured us into the Shelby Gem Factory with its "visitors welcome" signs. An employee greeted us at the door, and explained the process they use to grow crystals in different colors. So they manufacture rubies, diamonds, sapphires, etc. right here along our bike path.

Denisa had spotted a wild apple tree along the trail, so on our return trip we had to stop there for a snack. But the stop wasn't long, as those pesky mosquitoes swarmed as soon as we stopped our bikes. 

Mosquitoes can't catch us as long as we keep rolling, but we found that they find us as soon as we stop. So it was a pretty fast 16-mile bike trip today.

We loaded the bikes onto the car, and then made another important stop in the town of Hart. This is the Rennhack Orchards Market, the home of the apples we bought at the Barbecue and Apple Festival. We are now big fans of their SweeTango apples, and we're buying more today. We still have plenty in the refrigerator, but we're not leaving the area without a big supply. So we bought a peck of SweeTangoes off their "seconds" shelf. Because they might have some imperfections, we bought that 10 pound bag for around 80 cents per pound (rather than $2.49/pound that their pristine apples cost). What a great deal!

Just like the locals, we found that another way to beat this heat wave is to head to the beach. We are still enjoying the hunt for Petoskey stones, so as we get further south we are sad to see all these sandy beaches, void of the little beach stones that we enjoy.

But we got some local advice about two rocky beaches, and we spent the warmest days hanging out at Butterville and Summit beaches. No pictures, because we didn't have dry pockets in our swim suits for the camera. We got out the snorkel gear, and Mark went snorkeling for Petoskey stones. On a calm day, he could see through the clear water to see the rocks below him. He found the biggest stone in our growing collection using this new method. Too bad we weren't this good at looking for these elusive rocks when we were further north near the town of Petoskey!

On our final day here in Ludington, we finally took a field trip to explore the giant hill right in front of our campground. Unlike the forested hills around us, this one is strikingly bare of trees, and looks suspiciously man-made with its perfectly flat top.

That big man-made berm is all that separates our campground from Lake Michigan. It's a sizable hill--six miles around at the top, and big enough to play 600 football games at the same time up there. There is a parking lot and a trail that leads to informational kiosks that explains why that hill is here. We found that at the base of the hill along Lake Michigan is a hydro-electric generator plant, able to produce enough electricity for 1.3 million homes.

That's because at the top of that hill is a man-made reservoir that holds 27 billion gallons of water. With two-minutes notice, they can open 28-foot-tall pipes that send 33,000,000 gallons of water per minute gushing down-hill, and then spinning their electric generators. 

All of those big numbers just means this is a really big project, and we can't quite wrap our minds around the size of it all. We just hope all those billions of gallons of water at the top of our hill continue to flow out toward Lake Michigan, rather than towards our little campground. A flood of that magnitude would certainly cool us off, but we don't count it as a preferred method to beat this heat. After four days of sight-seeing here, it's time to head further south along the west coast side of this state to discover more wonders. And we've got good news--the weatherman says we have a cool front on the way! That's the best way to beat the heat!