Road trip! We spent half of June in Michigan to spend some quality time with our families and introducing Magnolia to her extended family who hasn't seen her yet. During this time I was itching to get out on a trail for some hiking and one of our friends suggested the Baw Beese walking trail, which connects to the North Country trail which is a huge trail that spans 4600 miles in 7 states from New York through Minnesota. There is a section of the North Country Trail which is around Baw Beese Lake and I was glad to hike on such a cool trail which was so close to my mother in law's house. I wondered why my husband never rode his bike farther on the trail, but he didn't really get into hiking until we moved to Colorado 10 years ago.
With the entire family in tow, we loaded up the stroller with water and started out of the house. It was at least 1 mile before we reached the paved trail and started down the path.
Getting there: The Baw Beese trail map can be found here, we picked up the path near Bacon street, but the path spans from Jonesville to Hillsdale to Osseo. The trail can be hard to navigate through the city, but the paved paths are great for biking, walking, and more. Specs: The trail passes through several parks which have port-o-pots and a playground area and a place to swim. The trail is very scenic with flowers, trees, benches and continues beside Baw Beese Lake for a time.
Start of the trail.
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The trail is a great place for walking your dog
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Lots of wildflowers along the path, however, not nearly as many as Colorado offers. The flowers were very different, and I don't know the names of these either :) Any one?
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The trail provides informative nature information, but its hard to tell what the signs are actually naming along the trail. Buckhorn is a small flower (or weed) that is found all over the Midwest. This is a super large sign, for such a small flower :)
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Sumac.
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Not as much shade as we would have liked, but some.
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The trail passes through several parks that offer swimming, boating, playground, picnic area and lots more!
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Lots of places to rest along the way
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One of the parks the trail passes through.
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This is a great place to stop and take a swing, if you are Magnolia. We also ate some lunch before walking further down the trail.
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Eventually the trail actually looks like what I am used to a 'trail' being -- a dirt path. We didn't go much farther than this, however, because the crew of people we were walking with were tiring out in the 90 degree heat and humidity.
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I'd really like to come back next summer and explore this on our bikes, if we can bring them. It looked like a great place to ride, very secluded and peaceful.
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The path continued beside the lake, this is part North Country Trail per our friends information. I can't believe I never hiked here as a youth, it wasn't far from my house, but I was a runner back then and don't think that hiking crossed my mind much until I got older and moved to Colorado.
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Passing the beach on our way back home, looked so enticing and I wished I had my suit!
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Baw Beese path sign.
Do you know any more about this trail, the North Country Trail, or others near Hillsdale Michigan? If so, please leave a comment or thought.
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