Warren Sand Dunes 2008 - Day 1

Our family spent a wonderful July 4th weekend on the west coast of Michigan -- This was the trip we were originally suppose to have on my birthday weekend, but was rainy and we canceled. But this weekend, we had the most perfect, beautiful weather with hardly a cloud in the sky and the temperature averaging 79 degrees! We are glad we waited!

We spent two days beaching, hiking and exploring Warren Sand Dunes State Park on the Lake Michigan shoreline. On Friday, the morning of the first day, we let the kids spend several hours in the morning swimming in our hotel pool. After taking showers and cleaning up, we went to a matinee of "Wall-E" at a nearby movie theater. It was a fun movie -- Really cute! Afterwards, we had lunch at this really fun "grinders" sandwich shop that was decorated as a 1950's hamburger/soda shop, and it was right across the street from the theater. Really yummy sandwiches with a fun atmosphere! We'll have to remember this place the next time we go back!

After lunch, we made our way over to the sand dunes. We learned that the park has three miles of golden dunes and offers six miles of intertwining trails throughout the park (See map here). So, we spent the day climbing, jumping, rolling and sliding on the sand dunes and hiking the trails. We had the greatest time! We climbed many, many dunes, some rising over 240 feet tall above the Lake Michigan shoreline. Alex and Logan were troopers! They climbed every hill by themselves, and some were incredibly steep! Tough enough that Joshua and I were really winded by the time we reached the top! But you really can't imagine how beautiful it was up there - looking out over the lake on one side of the dunes, and woodlands on the other. On the tallest dune, we could even see several Chicago skyscrapers across Lake Michigan! Next time we'll have to bring binoculars to improve our view of the Chicago skyline. Pretty amazing!

In the evening, we watched the sunset over the lake. It was unbelievably gorgeous! Our day exploring and enjoying the dunes was so much fun and convinced us that we'll have to come do this every summer from now on! The only bad thing is that now our car is covered in sand! We'll have to vacuum it later this week. I took over 100 pictures on our trip. I'll share some of my favorites from our first day...