Northern Michigan recreation and breweries: Benzie, Grand Traverse, and Leelanau County

June 2020, weekdays and weekend

Following are some of the places we visited during our 6-night stay at Indigo Bluffs RV Park and Resort in Empire, Michigan.

Recreation: biking, hiking

Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive is one of the closest trail heads to Indigo Bluffs RV Resort, so we loaded our bikes in the truck, and drove there to park in the national park parking lot. This is just over five miles from camp. The national park entrance fee was being waived due to COVID-19, and I am not sure if there is a place we could have parked for no charge, if this had not been the case. 

View from Glen Haven Historic Village along Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail

We then bicycled Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail to S. Forest Haven Drive in Glen Arbor and back, which was about a 13-mile ride. The trail runs along the dunes, lakeshore, and through DH Day Campground. The route is beautiful, and extremely hilly. There are several nice stopping points along the way. Before we left, I had thought we would be able to bike to Alligator Hill Trail; however, there is no shoulder along Stocking Road where the bike trail crosses at M-109, so we chose not to bike down the road. Back at the national park, there are several hiking trails from the parking lot at Pierce Stocking Drive that travel through the woods, and out to lake Michigan. It is a bit of a hike with a fabulous view. 

Alligator Hill Trail

We drove to Alligator Hill Trail, and hiked that a different day. The location is just over six miles from Indigo Buffs RV Resort. This was another hilly climb with a beautiful view! 

Islands Lookout at Alligator Hill

Scarlet Tanager at the start of Alligator Hill Trail

Empire, Michigan: Indigo Bluffs RV Park and Resort

June 2020, weekend-weekdays, 6-nights (campground site 432 and resort site 7)

Our Michigan camping vacation to the upper peninsula in May/June canceled due to COVID-19, so we chose this campground as an alternate when they opened a few weeks later.

Sunset view from campground site 432 at Indigo Bluffs

Arrival and check-in

We arrived less than half an hour after check-in time, and there were several campers in the parking area in front of the office. It only took us a couple of minutes at the office because they had everyone's arrival papers labeled and ready. Someone handed me our packet, and told us we were all set. The drive into the campground is a sharp right turn from the office directly after the pool. This was not explained to us, and we ended up driving through the resort side of the property before we entered the campground side. 😆 After you park in the pull-through spots in front of the office, you are facing the resort side when you pull ahead, and the resort gates were open when we arrived.

Fire on campsite 432; 431 & 433 labeled behind

Campsites 314, 315, 431, 432, 433

This was our first stay at this resort, and there are not individual site photos online. We were assigned site 432, which is a back-in site in front of sites 431 and 433. This site is full hookup with 50 amp power. 

Indigo Bluffs campsite 432

We thought this was a great site when we first arrived, and most of the other campsites were empty. After we got settled, we noticed that the front sites are wide because the area on both sides of our site are driveways to the back sites. A group of campers arrived late Friday and surrounded us for two nights. Campsite 432 was still fairly nice, although I did not understand why they chose to assign us a site amongst a group camping together when there were open sites farther down. The group gathered on site 431, which was quite secluded for them, as their camper and vehicles were parked between us with the woods behind them.