CNN Travel names Northwest Michigan among 24 places to visit in 2024

This week CNN Travel named our region, including Leelanau County and Traverse City, among the 24 best places to visit in the new year. The story encourages readers and travelers to “look at places that are still largely undiscovered, or alluring in the offseason, or frequently overlooked for their larger first cities or neighbors. Maybe it’s time to head to places that are making it easier for tourists to visit and those that pay close attention to encouraging tourism that’s sustainable.” Sleeping Bear Dunes is no stranger to national and international media exposure. In 2011 the ABC show “Good Morning America” named our region “the most beautiful place in America,” which immediately boosted tourism numbers to the National Lakeshore. The honor was largely the result of northern Michigan’s social media campaign, which we examined in this article.

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Twin Flames, Boat Fire, The Mill opens: Glen Arbor Sun’s top viewed stories of 2023

This year was a banner year for news in Leelanau County. The Glen Arbor Sun’s top viewed stories on our website in 2023 included the strange—a relationship coaching cult in Suttons Bay (“Twin Flames, a Suttons Bay cult, an inferno of controversy” was our fourth most-viewed story of all time); the heroic—a neighborhood effort to rescue boaters from a burning craft; the celebratory—The Mill made its long awaited opening on the Crystal River, and collaboration between the National Lakeshore and Leelanau Conservancy to preserve Glen Lake ridge property; the breaking news—an 18-hole putting course and restaurant planned to open next year in Glen Arbor; the historical—our 12-part series covering Leelanau’s farming families; and the reflective—remembering Horndog Newt Cole. Thanks for your readership, and Happy New Year! Here’s the list of our top 10 stories by online views in 2023.

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Free Family Fun at the National Lakeshore

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Hiking, snowshoeing, even watching how maple syrup is made, from tree to syrup. They’re all on tap (pun intended) at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore this winter. And even better than that, all the activities are free. “The Most Beautiful Place in America” according to ABC’s Good Morning America offers opportunities for fun and exploration not just in the summer but year-round. “The Dunes don’t close,” says Emily Sunblade, lead interpretation park ranger. Winter certainly provides a different experience than summer. For example, if there’s snow, the hikes become snowshoe hikes. More than that, snow cover provides the opportunity to explore beyond the trails, as rangers can safely lead hikers off the trails. “That won’t damage sensitive plants,” says Sunblade.

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Christmas in Cedar, not long ago

Linda Alice Dewey’s painting “Christmas in Cedar, not long ago” is a collaboration with Anne-Marie Oomen’s poem, “Solstice”

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National Lakeshore collaborates with Leelanau Conservancy to acquire, preserve Glen Lake ridgeline property

Late last month Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore acquired 8.66 acres of picturesque Miller Hill ridgeline property with views of the Glen Lakes and Lake Michigan from the Leelanau Conservancy for $685,000. Conservancy executive director Tom Nelson said the conservation of the Glen Lake Ridgeline project was the result of a collaboration with true, unsung heroes in the Glen Lake community and Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. The Conservancy and the Lakeshore have an innovative history of working together to acquire and preserve pristine and sensitive land. In 2005 the Conservancy acquired property along the Crystal River that had been potentially slated for a golf course and turned it over to the Lakeshore. The acquisition represented a happy ending to a saga that divided the local community.

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Does Leelanau Conservancy’s Palmer Woods mountain biking represent development or environmental stewardship?

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An important question hovers over the Leelanau Conservancy’s push to build a 10-car parking lot east of Wheeler Road, which mountain bikers will use starting next year to access the expanding Palmer Woods trail network. Neighbors opposed the initiative, but the Cleveland Township Board sided with the Conservancy and greenlit the project on Nov. 14. Do mountain bike trails and infrastructure in preserved natural areas reflect development (most mountain bikers drive fossil fuel-burning cars to access trails)? Or does the sport increase environmental awareness? In other words, does mountain biking compromise or help the environment?

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Dune Climb ready for sledding; more snow needed for skiing

Friends of Sleeping Bear Dunes, which helps maintain trails within the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore reports: “We’ve got SNOW! Over the past couple of days, we got about 5″ of fresh powder over the whole region. The ground was still warm, so some of it melted — especially on the paved portion of the Heritage Trail. We do not plan to groom the trail this time. The Dune Climb did look pretty good for sledding though!”

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Munson welcomes country doctor Daniel Hadley to Empire

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Not long after moving to the region, Empire’s new doctor Daniel Hadley and his family visited the Empire Heritage Day festival on Oct. 12, where they watched fresh apple cider being made and logs being sawed. At the town’s historic museum, he posed for a photo in front of a wooden buggy—the kind that a country doctor may have used to visit far-flung patients in their homes a century ago. Dr. Hadley won’t be making house calls at all hours down Leelanau County’s dusty two-track roads. But he will offer primary care four days a week to people of all ages at the clinic on M-22 just north of downtown. According to Munson Healthcare, the greater Empire area serves nearly 5,600 patients.

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Leelanau Fall reads: a rundown of local new books in 2023

We chatted with the experts, the bookworms, and bookstore owners, and here’s our roundup of local books, or books written by local authors, that were published in 2023. Find them at Leelanau County’s locally-owned, independent bookstores: Cottage Book Shop in Glen Arbor, Bay Books in Suttons Bay, Dog Ears Books in Northport, and Leelanau Books in Leland; or at your local library. Happy reading!

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Sleeping Bear Dunes to conduct prescribed fires this fall

The National Park Service plans to conduct prescribed fires in three burn units this fall at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. The fire is a tool intended to restore habitat in forested ecosystems in the park. The burn unit in Leelanau County covers approximately 75 acres within the National Lakeshore’s Leelanau District, between Pyramid Point, Bohemian Road, and the northern area of M-22, which is in the same vicinity of this past spring’s successful burns. In Benzie County, the burn units cover approximately 930 acres in the Platte District, between Otter Creek and Bass Lake.

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