After stopping in Miller Beach and New Buffalo, our travels through some top Chicago vacation-home destinations took us to St. Joseph, Michigan.
At 6:00 p.m. the sun was slowly sinking toward the lake, but the crowd at Silver Beach was still going strong. More than a dozen volleyball courts were in play, parents chased their children across the sand, and couples power-walked with their dogs past large-scale sculptures on the beachfront path.
There were plenty of people milling around in the city center – and no wonder, the streets in St. Joseph are paved in fudge. Fudge and ice cream. The glorious smell wafted out of Kilwin’s and Cabanas Ice Cream and Chocolate Cafe, all within a block of each other. We wanted to check out some of the new vacation-home developments in town, like Lighthouse Dunes or Sable Shores or Lighthouse Point, but there are more than 100 flavors to be tasted at Cabanas, and that’s not even including the snow cones they serve on the sidewalk.
We planned to ride out our sugar high hiking out to the city’s beloved North Pier lighthouse, a replica of the original built in 1832, but we got caught up hunting down all 30 miniature cars, designed by regional artists, in an outdoor exhibit spread throughout town. We wandered past palaces with nicely manicured lawns on a bluff overlooking the water, bought a donut the size of our face from Dale’s Donut Factory, and spent some time people watching under the floating Chinese lanterns outside the Krasl Art Center.
With all the families on the street, it feels like there’s a festival in town, but I guess it’s just another Monday night in St. Joseph.