The Dune Climb — Four Hundred Feet of Sand
Near Sleeping Bear Dunes, Michigan
The Dune Climb is one of the most popular activities in Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, and it is less a hike than a negotiation with physics. The climb begins at a parking area and ascends a steep sand slope over a short horizontal distance, with the sand surface shifting underfoot in a way that makes every step slightly less effective than it would be on solid ground. For every full step forward, you slide back partway. Children typically race up. Adults typically do not.
The reward at the top is the view into the dune bowl beyond, and beyond that, the surface of Lake Michigan visible in the distance. Visitors who want to reach the lake from the top of the dune have a long stretch of soft sand to cover before they get there. The National Park Service recommends against attempting this without enough water and without accounting for the return crossing, which takes considerably longer than the outbound trip because you are exhausted.
The entire dune system here rests atop the glacial moraine bluffs, so the drop from the crest of the dune to the lake below is not just the height of the dune itself but the combined height of the dune and the bluff underneath it. That is what makes the view at the top so surprising. You climbed a sand hill and found a cliff.
