We decided to rush home, and visit Hampton Beach, NH. See the above photo. Or....maybe not. Maybe...we visited the Indiana (?!) Dunes National Lakeshore. Did you know that Indiana had shoreline on Lake Michigan? See here. After a bit of a trial finding the visitor center, we drove to the entrance to a trail to Indiana's "Mount Baldy", a "large" sand dune on Lake Michigan. It is 123 feet tall and is the largest "living" dune that marram grass and cottonwood trees cannot hold in place. This mound of sand actually moves south at a rate of four to five feet each year, burying all woodlands in its path. If someone blindfolded you and dropped you on the shore of Lake Michigan (or any of the Great Lakes) without tasting the water (it's fresh, not salt, obviously), you'd be hard pressed to know that you were not at the edge of an ocean. The water was shallow on the beach beyond the dunes, and so the water was refreshingly cool (not bone-numbing cold as is Atlantic waters). We spent a little time on the beach, and moved on.
Our next stop was to be the Auburn Cord-Dusenberg museum, an auto museum about 2 hours south of the Dunes. Our only miscalculation was that we had crossed the time zone to eastern, and had lost an hour during the day. By the time we got there, we didn't really have enough time to properly explore, but still got a great look at the museum. We saw one of the first front wheel drive cars, a giant 156" wheel base 1930s Cord (very cool looking), an early electric car from the turn of the century, and a prototype 30s car with disappearing headlights. Too bad we didn't really have the time to do this place justice. We were the last ones out the door before the ticket taker.
On to Toledo where we will spend the night.
See photos of the day here.
No comments:
Post a Comment