On day 3 of our big Michigan Road Trip with little kids, we drove the scenic route from Sleeping Bear Dunes to Mackinaw City via US Route 31 to Petoskey and then M119’s Tunnel of Trees to Mackinaw. It was very enjoyable and I wish we’d had more time to stop at every single little place that caught our eye, but with little kids it’s hard to do that! So we picked a few key stops which turned out great and left the “runners up” to be shared in this post in case you’re interested in more options!

Why Take Scenic Route 31 and M-119

When driving from Sleeping Bear Dunes to Mackinaw City there are basically two options: the inland highway route or the lakeshore scenic route. Both ways take about 3 hours, but the scenic route US-31 passes by forests and fields, along the lakeshore, through multiple cute little towns, and the opportunity to drive the Tunnel of Trees (the M-119, which does add more time to drive). We decided to go the scenic route because with only 3 hours to drive for the day, we had a lot of spare time to fill; with little kids we need to stop a lot anyway and the scenic route provided lots of options; and a bunch of blog posts and TripAdvisor recommendations I read made it sound enjoyable. Also, for some reason I really wanted to go to the lavender farm!

About Michigan Route 31 and M-119

Route 31

The US Route 31 is a major north-south highway that runs across the United States from the bottom of Alabama almost to the top of Michigan. In Michigan it is part of the Lake Michigan Circle Tour as it travels along the lakeside through multiple tourist destinations before ending just south of Mackinaw City. We took Route 31 from Traverse City to Petoskey. That part of the drive is predicted to take 1 1/2 hours without stops, but I’d expect it to take longer seeing as it’s an undivided highway that trails by farmland, shoreline, and multiple small towns. Just after Petoskey, Route 31 continues north to Mackinaw City but you can turn off on Highway M-119 toward the Tunnel of Trees, like we did.

M-119 Tunnel of Trees

Highway M-119 is a 27.5 mile two lane road between Petoskey and Cross Village. From Petoskey it runs north around Little Traverse Bay through several towns and after Harbor Springs it officially becomes the Tunnel of Trees Scenic Heritage Route, which is known for its thick trees arching over a winding road with no centerline that runs through forests and farmlands and past some cute little stores and restaurants, with a rare view of the lake. Be prepared for a slow leisurely drive, as the road is curvy, you might get stuck behind a slow driver, and it can get very busy (especially on weekends and in the fall when the leaves turn color). The tunnel ends in Cross Village, basically in the middle of nowhere, so you can go back the way you came, take the backroads to Route 31,continue north to Sturgeon Bay Beach (be warned, the road was bad when we went in 2020) and across to 31 or up to Wilderness State Park, or head back down to Harbor Springs via C-77 (that whole loop is 50 miles, about 1 1/4 hours, and has a good map with all the stop here).

Resources

Here are some sites that inspired our own trip, that you might find helpful, about these scenic routes:

Michigan Scenic Drive Route 31 and M-119 from Sleeping Bear Dunes to Mackinaw with Little Kids

Here are some good stops and ideas based on our experience, in order from Sleeping Bear to Mackinaw.

1) Traverse City

From our campsite at Sleeping Bear Dunes we drove to Traverse City (about 1/2 hour). It is a popular spot known for its food and wine, and is a good home base for exploring the whole region as it’s pretty close to Sleeping Bear Dunes, winery tours, beaches, lighthouses, and tons of outdoor activities. Originally I thought we would pack up early and get good coffee and breakfast in Traverse City, but turns out it takes longer to pack up camp with little kids and a pregnant lady, so we headed out after camp coffee and breakfast and only passed through the city. However I do know that if you like whiskey, they have some good distilleries – our friends visited Traverse City Whiskey Co. and really like the whiskey they brought home!

Here are some good links for Traverse City:

2) Charlevoix

From there we drove to Charleviox (about 1 hour), a small town right next to the beach with the cutest little main street of boutiques and cafes and flower baskets on lightposts, and a drawbridge! I’ve wanted to stop here ever since reading Gathering Twig’s blog post, but on our first Michigan trip the kids were napping. I wish I could have gone shopping downtown or stayed for a few days like the folks in the blog! On our second Michigan trip we did stop at the beach in Charlevoix for a picnic lunch and sand play. Here are some recommendations based on that trip:

  • Michigan Beach Park – this a nice beach in a great location! It has a playground, picnic tables, bathroom, and a little cafe, which was closed when we visited. It’s also right next to the light station and boat channel. We had a picnic lunch here and played in the sand. (Side note: way south of the beach is a weird dome – it’s a cement factory, and gives the whole place an odd futuristic feel!)

  • Charlevoix South Pier Light Station – a very little lighthouse type station, we walked here from the beach.
  • Round Lake Channel – this is a waterway connecting Lake Michigan to Round Lake. It has a walking path next to it which you can take to the drawbridge and downtown, or stand and watch the boats come in and out. The boys lucked out and saw a crane-boat pass through to a construction site further up the shore!

  • Find Petoskey Stones – these are rocks made of fossilized coral and are found in this region of Michigan – for more about finding them click here. I thought for sure the beach would be picked over but I did find one!

Here are the runners up, things I wish we’d done but we didn’t have time to do:

  • Downtown Charlevoix – stroll main street and do some window shopping! The downtown looked so cute!
  • Eat – my top picks just from Googling it would be buying crepes to go at That French Place and eating them by the drawbridge, or eat over at Bridge Street Tap Room with views of Round Lake!
  • Mushroom Houses – go see a bunch of unique houses with mushroom shaped thatched rooves! This is the website: Earl Young Mushroom Houses and this is the walking tour map:  Earl Young Brochure. If I’d thought fast enough we could have just taken a little detour through town to see them.
  • Castle farms – just outside of downtown Charlevoix, it has a large outdoor model railroad, gardens, wine, and more – it looks like a fun place to take the family! We would have gone if we’d had more time. For more see Castle Farms – Visit Charlevoix

And here are some good links for Charlevoix:

3) Lavender Hill Farm

For some reason I really wanted to go to a lavender farm (perhaps it was my pregnancy nausea?) so from Charlevoix we took a 15 minute detour east to Lavender Hill Farm, where we stopped for lunch. Everyone loved it! Apparently it’s the biggest lavender farm in Michigan, but it felt very small and friendly. You park in the front next a little u-pick lavender field which is surrounded by several outbuildings, including one with a lavender essential oil distillery that sometimes has demonstrations. As of 2020 there was no food sold there except for special lunch and dinner events, so we had our own picnic lunch at the van. (Actually, the store did sell lavender fizzy lemonade and shortbread, which was consumed).

I did the u-pick lavender field, you can see it just behind the van in the pic above. You are given a big twisty tie and a scissors an told that you can take as much as you want that fits within the twisty tie. I originally thought it was a little pricey, but let me tell you, it takes a lot more time and lavender than you think to cut enough to fill that twisty tie!

Just above the parking area sits a beautiful 100 year old restored red barn, which is used for special events and live music – and when we were there in 2020, held the boutique store so they could spread things out due to covid. If you don’t want to do the u-pick, there are plenty of options for buying lavender and related products here! Or be like the 2 year old and run up and down the long ramp over and over and over.

 

Behind the barn are rows and rows of lavender fields spread around the hillside with trails for walking and enjoying the views. The kids loved running down the hills and would have done that forever if we let them.

Overall we loved it and recommend stopping! You could easily spend several hours here if you watched the distillery demo and walked all the fields. I think we spent only 1 or 1.5 hours, because we wanted to keep going on our scenic route.

4) Petoskey

From Lavender Hill Farm to Petoskey took about 15 minutes. Petoskey is a bigger town on Little Traverse Bay of Lake Michigan and a hub for the surrounding resort communities. The downtown is quite large with lots of cute stores, old Victorian buildings and fine dining. It’s also known for young Ernest Hemmingway having spent summers at his family’s vacation home on Walloon Lake and his book The Torrents of Spring being based on Petoskey. We did not stop because we knew we’d be staying here on the way back (see the blog post here) – but based on that limited exposure, my main recommendations are shopping downtown, food and  beer at Petoskey Brewing, and the beach at Petoskey State Park!

Here are some good links for more info and recommendations on Petoskey:

5) Tunnel of Trees

From Petoskey we continued on to the Tunnel of Trees! It’s about 10 minutes from Petoskey to Bay View where Highway M-119 splits off from US-31, and then another 10 minutes to Harbor Springs, where the Tunnel of Trees officially starts. (Side note: Harbor Springs looked super cute and if we’d had time I would have stopped to shop the quaint main street. For inspiration see Harbor Springs guide from GoCatchTheDrift.com). The Tunnel part from Harbor Springs to Cross Village takes about an hour, it’s 20 miles long and 45 mph max, but it will probably take longer if there are slow cars and you make any stops (and if you have to drive back to where you started), so give yourself several hours. It’s definitely a leisurely enjoy your afternoon type of drive! Here is a good map with some common scenic stops along the way.

The Tunnel of Trees is known for its tall trees arching across the road, and that they did. However, the only picture I got of the “tunnel” was trying to take one of the lake in a rare gap between the trees:

The M-119 is definitely windy with some hairpin turns so if you have any carsick kiddos, consider getting them dramamine or at least make them look out the windows. Also, I wouldn’t recommend this for long trailers or even big RVs – we were definitely glad we were in our little van! (If you want to correct me please leave a comment, I’ve never actually driven a big RV before!).

To be honest, I wasn’t that impressed with the Tunnel drive – I grew up on California’s redwoods and cypress tree tunnels which are a lot more dramatic. This drive was also more residential with less scenic stops than I was expecting. HOWEVER, no doubt it would be beautiful in the fall when normal trees turn magical. Overall I’m glad we did it because it’s a unique part of Michigan and it took us to Pond Hill Farm, which we loved!

Here are some good links for more info on the Tunnel of Trees and potential stops along the way:

6) Pond Hill Farm

Not far into the Tunnel of Trees drive we stopped at Pond Hill Farm. It’s a sweet farm property with a little store, brewery, playground, petting zoo, and hiking trails including a 1.5 mile Gnome House Hunt. We all loved it!

First we explored a little. The property was beautiful, with flowers everywhere, and cute animals I didn’t get a picture of.

There was a huge playground area with fun equipment made out of natural elements like wood and tires and a pile of dirt, hah. The kids loved it! (And we loved that it wore them out for the rest of the car ride). There was also a big field with what appeared to be activities like a two story tall slingshot and a bucket train ride, but none of those were open, maybe because it was a weekday.

Then we got a beer sampler and snacks at the brewery and ate outside. I got the boys ice cream from the gift store. It was very pleasant!

On the way back to the car we stopped and petted all the animals, which were spread out around the property. I suspect that was due to covid and trying to space things out – they definitely did a good job adapting to regulations so they could stay open, and we’re glad they did, because it was a really nice stop!

7) Cross Village

Cross Village marks the end of the Tunnel of Trees. Its name comes from early records that the famous French Jesuit Father Jacques Marquette raised a huge white cross on the bluffs overlooking Lake Michigan back in the 1600’s – today there is a replica which can be seen from the lake. The area was once a gathering place for many tribes and is known for its Odawa and Ojibwe culture. Now it has a few popular pit stops and is a good launching point for the Tunnel of Trees and Sturgeon Bay.

Cross Village was another another tiny town I wish we’d been able to stop at (and by tiny I mean we almost missed it), but again the kids were napping and we weren’t hungry. However, here are some ideas of what to do based on the blogs I read:

  • Leg’s Inn – a famous Polish/American restaurant and Historic Landmark, run by the same family for over 80 years, full of hand carved furniture and driftwood sculptures, with an outdoor patio and views of the lake (for more see Why Legs Inn by AdventureMomBlog)
  • Good Hart General Store – “world famous pot pies”, grocery, gift store, bakery, and more
  • Old World Café – gets excellent reviews
  • Art studios – there’s a few in the area

From Cross Village you can turn around and do the Tunnel again, go east and take back roads to the freeway to back to where you came, or continue north on the perimeter of the lake on N Lakeshore Dr up to Sturgeon Bay. We had some time and the kids were still napping so we decided to keep going!

8) Sturgeon Bay

From Cross Village we continued north on N Lakeshore Dr to Sturgeon Bay, which is supposedly 7 miles in 15 miles, but it was the longest ride of my life. At some point (I don’t remember when) the road became incredibly rough, potholed and patched up, very remote, and we had no GPS or data access or maps, so we were very thankful nothing happened with the old van! And very glad the it had gotten new shocks right before the trip. (This was in 2020 so I hope they have fixed it by the time you’re reading this.)

However, if you have the time Sturgeon Bay would be worth a visit – it’s an isolated, undeveloped, beautiful shoreline with beaches, sand dunes, views, and trail access. After driving 5 miles north from Cross Village, N Lakeshore Dr intersects Sturgeon Bay Trail (road), you turn left and it whips around right to a long stretch of public shoreline, with beach access on one side and dunes on the other. There is roadside parking and seasonal toilets.

Once again, we didn’t actually stop here due to time, but now that I’ve researched it a bit here are some suggestions of what to do here:

  • Beaches – there are miles of public undeveloped beach with crystal clear water and it’s a good place for sunsets and stargazing
  • Look for endangered species – Sturgeon Bay is home to the endangered Piping Plover bird, look for the 15 year old BRR!
  • Dunes – there are moderate sized sand dunes off N Lakeshore Dr that you can hike up for what I hear are good views of Lake Michigan, and then access the trails or run back down!
  • Trails – this area meets up with the North Country Trail system and provides access into the Wilderness State Park trails; for a pretty good map click here; for more about the North Country Trail system which stretches 4,700 miles across eight states from North Dakota to Vermont click here! Also see this hike article Fill Your Day At Sturgeon Bay.

Note: There is also a Sturgeon Bay in Wisconsin so if you search the internet for more info make sure to say it’s the one in Michigan.

This is the only picture I have from Sturgeon Bay – it’s of the incredibly potholed road before we got there:

If you made it this far, you are probably wondering what those other things are north of Sturgeon Bay. Here are some bonus activity options:

Wilderness State Park

Above Sturgeon Bay and blocking your ability to continue driving the perimeter of Michigan is Wilderness State Park: 10,000+ acres of forest, meadows, ponds, and wetlands with 26 miles of shorelines. There are 250 campsites, some cabins, hiking, swimming beaches, a dog beach, a geocaching trail, parts of The North Country Trail, lots of recreational opportunities, and beautiful sunsets and stargazing). It seems like a great place to camp but at 10 miles from Mackinaw City I wanted something a little closer, so we decided to stay at Mackinaw Mill Creek Camping. For reviews on the camping and what it’s like to visit see the TripAdvisor page or CampGroundReviews page; there is also a good comparison between the two campgrounds here.

Headlands International Dark Sky Park

Just a bit beyond Wilderness State Park and next to Mackinaw City is the Headlands International Dark Sky Park, one of only 10 such parks around the world, which means it will stay dark and protected forever. It has 600 acres of forest, 2 miles of undeveloped shoreline, trails (including one with signage every 10th of a mile about the solar system), dark skies without light pollution, an event center, dark sky viewing area, and special programs. No camping, but open 24 hours and no entrance fee. From the reviews I read, if you want to stargaze you should go at dusk/sunset before the main parking lot fills up and find a seat at the event center’s amphitheater style viewing area, where there are sometimes astronomers who share their telescopes. Do bring chairs, blankets, a red filter for your flashlight, and bug spray. People do bring kids, you may want to go early to wear them out with some trails. There are often special events so check out their Facebook page for what’s coming up!

9) Dinner at Biere De Mac

Back on track to our scenic drive 🙂 After the rough road through Sturgeon Bay back to the freeway, we were happy to be back in civilization and reception! It took about 20 minutes from the bay to Biere De Mac in Mackinaw City, where we stopped for an early dinner. We heard about the brewery from a Eurovan forum poster, who recommended it because the owner used to have a Eurovan. It’s a very well done little place and we enjoyed our meal. The owner was actually walking around the floor checking in on guests so we got to meet him.

10) Michilimackinac State Park

From there it was a quick hop up to our last stop of the day, Michilimackinac State Park, which is the whole area just before Mackinac Bridge and includes beautiful views and some historic sights. There are many names and things in this area which I found super confusing, but I think I got it figured out, so let me enlighten you as I list what there is to do here:

  • Michilimackinac State Park is the whole area – you can use the park for free, and must pay to get into the fort and lighthouse. The Visitor’s Center is under the bridge.

  • The State Park day-use area is to the right of the bridge and free to the public. It includes a waterfront walkway, beach, picnic areas, and gazebo. This area was really nice! The boys played in the sand while we watched the sunset. We could also see Mackinac Island, which got them excited for our visit tomorrow.

  • Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse is in the main park area so you can go right up to it but you must pay to enter. The museum and activities sounded great, you can climb to the top, but by sunset it was already closed so we missed it. It has been guarding the straits since 1889 and I thought it was really beautiful.

  • Colonial Michilimackinac is to the left of the bridge and on the site of the old Fort Michilimackinac. It used to be a French and later British fur trading village and military outpost, and today has been rebuilt for education and reenactments. It was too late for us to visit, but sounds interesting.
  • Alexander Henry Park is located next to the State Park and connects by the waterfront walkway.

Where To Stay

Mackinaw Mill Creek Camping, Mackinaw City

We ended our day with another quick hop over to Mackinaw Mill Creek Camping for a one night stay. This was a nice big campground with lots to offer: tons of campsites, including lakefront sites, big bathroom areas, cabins, and a great old school playground – but it was very crowded. Also, our campsite was very wet, even though it hadn’t rained, which was weird. However, the beach campsites looked amazing! Originally I wondered how safe those would be when camping with little kids that might just wander away into the water, but it appeared they had rocks to kind of block the beach from those sites so cars can’t just drive onto the sand, that I think would block or slow down little kids from escaping, so I would feel comfortable camping with our family at one of those sites in the future. Imagine being able to go on a morning swim and play in the water all afternoon, right in your campsite’s backyard!

One last thing I wish we’d had time for was the Historic Mill Creek Discovery Park, which is just a mile down the road and sounds like a crazy mix of historical sites with costumed interpreters, a sawmill tour and demo, hiking trails, animal presentations, and a zipline!

Conclusion

Whew, congrats if you made it through that whole post! I hope you found it helpful and are inspired to take your own scenic drive up the North Western Michigan Coast. The next day we headed over to Mackinac Island, see my post about that here: One Day On Mackinac Island With Little Kids (without a campervan)!