I took this trip to Michigan back in late September/early October of 2021! This was my first ever solo road trip!! There were a couple of reasons for selecting Michigan: (1) I have a lot of family in Michigan, and so that helped the trip be cheaper AND more safe (that last point is for my parents), (2) I ran a virtual half marathon at the end of May 2021 and wanted to run one in-person…just so happens there is a really beautiful course at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in early October every year (check it out), and (3) I think Michigan is a really beautiful and underrated state. I believe in the latter a whole lot more after this trip.

The Itinerary:
Day 1: Drive to Algonac State Park (MI) to camp overnight and stop in Cleveland, OH on the way (visit Lake Erie – my first Great Lake!!)
Day 2: Visit Lake Huron, drive to Ann Arbor, MI (got a bonus visit with my cousin’s wife while here!!)
Day 3: Visit my grandma in Chelsea, MI then head to Indiana Dunes National Park to explore and camp
Day 4: Explore Indiana Dune NP, visit Warren Dunes State Park, visit my aunt and uncle in Benton Harbor, MI
Day 5: Drive up the coast of Lake Michigan to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, with a stop in Holland, MI to embrace my Dutch roots
Day 6: Explore Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore
Day 7: Run a half marathon, then join my cousins in Grand Rapids, MI for a Polish Festival
Day 8: Visit Meijer Gardens and spend time with my cousins and aunts in Grand Rapids, MI
Day 9: Drive home and go to work for one day before getting hand surgery and being out for another week (LOL…my boss was great)

Some funny things about this trip:

1. I decided less than two weeks before leaving for this trip that I was going to camp some nights to help save money. I did not have any camping gear. I had also never truly camped before (technically I camped while in Peru, but it was very different). So I drove the 45 minutes-1 hour to the nearest REI, hated everything there, went to the LL Bean across the street to cheer up, and ended up buying almost all of my camping gear there (as well as at Sierra) – I now LOVE camping!! The campgrounds at Indiana Dunes NP are still my favorite!! (Though there is one in the Adirondacks that I will be gatekeeping until I leave NY)

2. I decided to visit Indiana Dunes NP because on a “Travelers of U.S. National Parks” page on Facebook, a lot of people shat on this park and said it wasn’t worth the visit. Me being me, I HAD to go see what was so bad about it. I…LOVED it.

3. My cousin and his wife joined me in Sleeping Bear for the race, and THANK GOODNESS, because my tire pressure light came on while there and I’m an idiot and did not know how to even check that. He was a great cousin and taught me how to check my tire pressure and how to fill up your tires. I would recommend knowing how to do this (+ some other general safety things)  before driving 10+ hours away by yourself.

Some (not that) brief takeaways from this trip:

1. I LOVED Indiana Dunes NP. A lot of people don’t like it because it’s nestled between two power plants. But, in a way, that’s part of why I like this park so much. Because it shows how important these parks are and how powerful communities can be!! If the local community had not fought to save the dunes, they would have been turned into a power plant too. I don’t know why this park felt so special to me. But it did. Truly the best I’ve ever felt was while I was there. It was like coming home to a place I’d never been before.

2. Speaking of liking things that a lot of people don’t…Cleveland…is fun. Granted, I was only there for ~2 hours, but I really enjoyed it!! I told my parents that they brainwashed me into hating Ohio (they met at University of Michigan).

3. Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is still the most beautiful place I have ever been, hands down. I will be returning. I saw the most beautiful sunset of my entire life while there…I literally dropped to my knees it was so stunningly beautiful.

4. I have amazing extended family and I feel so lucky to be so close to my cousins and my aunts.

5. I’m also really happy that I got to visit my grandma while on this trip. My grandma is technically my step-grandma, but she is all I’ve ever known, so to me she is just grandma. We’ve always had a sort of special bond. She is genuinely one of the most kind, caring, loving, adventurous, and funny people I have ever known. I hope to be just like her. She shared some very sweet words with me that day that I will always carry with me. My grandma died less than a year later.

6. Last, but not least, I am so much braver than I think. I learned a lot about myself on this trip. And I love that I did this trip even though I know some people didn’t want me to. I did it because I wanted to. And because I had to. It’s one of the first and biggest acts of starting to live for myself rather than living for others. Ever since I started living for me, and not for someone else, life got so much better. Sometimes I worry that I like being alone too much, but maybe someday someone will come along that fits in nicely with this life I’ve created for myself.

OK. Now pictures 🙂