THE SLEEPING BEAR

August 24, 2011  Dateline: Frankfort, MI USA

The strong winds of yesterday continued into today so it was another day of sitting still. Rich and Carol joined Ross and Nancy of Oddysea and rented a car to drive to the Sleeping Bear National Lake Shore Park.

The Chippewa Indians said that the sleeping bear dunes were created when a mother bear swam across Lake Michigan with her two bear cubs.  When she got to the western shore of the Lake she turned and her cubs were not with her.  She lay down on the shore and went to sleep to wait for them.  She became the huge sand dunes and her cubs became the North and South Manitou Islands.

I sailed past the dunes three days ago so today’s posting is devoted to what Rich and Carol saw and told me.

Contrary to Indian legend the dunes were formed by the advancing and receding glaciers of more than 10,000 years ago.  The westerly wind blows the sand up and over the dunes making them “walk” inland.  In 1985 the Park Service placed a measured board at the inland base of the dune.  The board was marked in foot increments up to 70 feet.  Since 1985 the dune has moved 64 feet inland.  You can climb up the dune and take a 3.5 mile walking tour around the top of the dune; Rich and Carol did not take the tour.

They visited a place called Glen Haven.  Glen Haven is a town that was founded as a fueling station for the steamers that sailed the Great Lakes.  In 1857 there was a boarding house built in the town for the lumberjacks and that building still stands today.  David H. Day ran the station for a number of years and finally purchased it.  Seeing that coal was replacing wood as the steamship fuel, Day went into the lumber business.  As he cut down all of the nearby trees Day again realized he needed to change his business plan.  The clear cut fields provided a place for farming and he went to New York coming back with 5,000 fruit trees, cherry and apple.  He then opened a canning business and shipped his cherries through the Great Lakes.  Continuing with his thoughts and ideas in 1922 he saw the opportunity to turn Glen Haven into a tourist location; however the Great Depression ended that venture.  Day’s wife operated the general store in Glen Haven, the store is still operating today and has its Red Crown gasoline pump outside.

Within the Park there is museum about the US Life Saving Service, one of the precursors of today’s Coast Guard.  The passage between Sleeping Bear and Manitou Islands is dangerous.  Up until about 2 weeks ago there had been 47 ship wrecks in the passage. Two weeks ago a tour boat was hit by a rogue wave; it went aground and became number 48. Everybody onboard was okay.  The picture on the left is the equipment that was used to let a rescue line to the floudering boat.

Below is a picture of Glen Lake just to the east of Lake Michigan.  Glen Lake was a bay in prehistoric Lake Algonquin.  Glen Lake was cut off by sand moving steadily along the shoreline as Lake Algonquin receded.

Glen Haven was also served fishing boats.  Here is a picture of the fishing tug call Aloha.  She is 41 feet long had a draft of 5 feet, weighted 26 tons, had a single 50-60 horsepower engine and was built in 1937.  Rich learned about her design, she was enclosed so she could be fished all year long and while made of wood the metal sheathing below the water line enabled her to break through the lake ice.