Rumor has it, there are huge ice caves on the big lake. Lake Michigan doesn’t freeze over every year. But this has been an exceptional winter so far.

So we had to go see for ourselves. And the rumors are true. There are huge ice caves on Lake Michigan. They are really good just out from the shore a few miles north of Leland. You have to park and walk a bit as the road is blocked off out to the lake.

And in case you make it past the barricades, the county road ends at the water. As the signs says. You probably shouldn’t drive past here anyway. 🙂

We walked onto the ice about 400 yards from the shoreline.

There were huge pieces of ice sticking straight up and frozen in in place vertically.

There were giant snow boulders encapsulated in huge sheets of ice.

There were ice caves about thirty feet high. Notice the people in the cave…and the big crack the ceiling of the cave? Yikes!

There was white ice and blue ice and clear ice. We discovered clear ice buried under the snow. This picture was taken looking through very thick ice looking down onto the floor of Lake Michigan. The image on the right is not colorized! That’s how it really looked. The ice was more than one foot thick and the water was about six feet deep and it was this clear.

What an awesome experience we had today!

Please share your thoughts and leave feedback and or questions.

And follow us on our next adventure in and around the Grand Traverse area!

Edited: A note about safety. The ice can be very dangerous.  We are not suggesting you go out there. You can enjoy the views from the comfort of your own home online. 🙂 When we went out the temperatures had been well below freezing for more than three weeks. The next day the temperatures rose close to freezing and even a little above making for extremely dangerous ice conditions. Someone fell and got hurt.  Remember ice is very slippery too.