Garden, MI

July, 2024

If you love old towns (and I mean–who doesn’t, right?) there’s a super cool place for you that’s way off the beaten track. Garden, MI has the old town feel of days gone by. It does take a bit of a trip to get there, though. 🚗

On the way to get to the Garden Peninsula, we took the scenic drive along US-2 in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. We always love driving along US-2 and stopping at one of the many roadside parks or beaches. 🏞 ⛱ This time we took a bit of a detour to see Seul Choix Lighthouse near Gulliver, MI. 🤩 (I’m sure that’s a surprise since we definitely go out of our way to explore lighthouses, lol.) 😏

We haven’t been to Seul Choix in over 20 years. It’s definitely changed quite a bit. 😲 Now there’s a gift shop onsite and some of the outbuildings are open that weren’t before. When we took the tour so many years ago, we were told about some strange happenings in the lighthouse quarters, as many claim it is haunted. 👻 There have been quite a few books & articles published about the hauntings, but we didn’t encounter any ghosts on this visit. 🙃

Instead of opting for a tour today, the kiddos wanted to explore the rugged shoreline, so that was what we focused on while we were there. 🌊 The shoreline here is absolutely breathtaking. 😍 It’s not a sand beach, or even gravelly. This has some really cool resistive limestone rock which came from the bedrock below Lake Michigan. It was easy to walk on and and the shallow pools between the cracks of the rock allowed for some interesting viewing of tiny marine life. 🐚 It was amazing to see some of the wildflowers springing up from the crevices as well. 💮

After our detour, we drove down the Garden Peninsula to reach Fayette Historic State Park. Back in 1867, Fayette used to be one of the UP’s most productive iron-smelting locations. The town in the state park has been partially restored and one of the buildings was under-construction while we visited. 🚧 Some of the buildings you can explore are the Machine Shop, Company Office, Town Hall, Superintendant’s House, Doctor’s House, the Hotel, and a Laborer’s Cabin. A lot of the furnished rooms are protected by glass, so some of the pictures are not as good as I would have hoped. However, it was nice to be able to take a self-guided tour at our own pace and learn about life in the 1800’s. 😄 (Guided tours are also available for those who would prefer that option.)

The site is located on Snail Shell Harbor just off Big Bay De Noc. The view of the sandstone bluffs across the Harbor was so pretty to see. 🥰 The whole area was beautiful and it was an enjoyable experience for the whole family.

The iron saga will be continued in the next edition of Traveling with the Trapps. Stay tuned, lol. 😉

We hope you are enjoying our travels! We’d love for you to share it with your friends, if you’d like. Thanks so much and see you soon! 🤗

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