Visit Leland while you’re there. Great fishing village vibe
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My Mom is one of ten siblings and most of them spends a week or more in N. Michigan each summer. They’re scattered all over the western side of the state. Frankfort, Petosky, Charlevoix and TCity all great. But my favorite is Harbor Springs even though it’s a long way from Crystal Downs.
My dream is owning a small cabin in Harbor where I can escape the humidity of Bama summers.
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If you don’t need “city” amenities 24/7, I’d steer clear of TC and focus on the Leelanau Peninsula. Leland/Sutton’s Bay/Northport/Lake Leelanau all offer lakefront homes and their own charm without the congestion of TC in the summer.
As someone who vacations up there every year and loves TC, I’d never stay there.
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Harbor springs/Petoskey is an excellent spot too. If you go you must check out Petoskey brewing. Cross Village is north of Harbor and is a very cute village with an awesome beach. Both Harbor and petoskey are good sized towns and offer a lot to do but TC is still bigger.
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Surtons Bay s nice up that way too.
Since we are on the topic, does anyone know if Petoskey has restrictions on rentals?
Whenever we look up there there are plenty of (expensive) rentals in Harbor Springs, but none in Petoskey. The closest we were able to find is a place across the street from Toski-Sands, which I would call on the border of Petoskey. All of those homes near the downtown look so great, though. That would be a fantastic spot to stay, but we’ve never seen a single one listed.
In Petoskey as of June 1, 2014, vacation rentals, or renting of residential property for less than 30 days, is only allowed in a business district with a City license. New vacation rentals are not allowed in residential districts.
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If you’re referring to the Harbor Cove rentals, which are sort of across the street from Toski-Sands (LOVE Toski-Sands btw), then make sure you do your homework. There are really good units, but also units that haven’t been updated in 25 years and have really rough kitchen and bathroom setups. Also - it feels like there are a growing # of owners who live there year round and aren’t at all interested in making vacationers feel welcome.
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Echoing your Harbor Cove feedback. Both from an individual unit quality perspective and the view on renters. We’ve needed to do a lot more research in units the last 5ish years. And my family has been renting there for 35 years and have felt the attitude shift among owners.
But also over by Toski Sands there are the Trout Creek condos which is the ones they could be referencing as I believe those are actually in Petoskey.
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Those are in Harbor Springs, right across the street from The Highlands. We stayed there last July and it was a nice place. Good condo, updated, 3 different pools (2 outdoor one indoor) basketball courts, big field with soccer nets etc. We drove in to charlevoix and Petoskey one day and up to the soo locks as well, though it’s much closer to hit Mackinac city and head to the island than to go all the way to the locks.
The other thing worth doing if you get that close to the bridge is the Headlands Dark Sky park.
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Can take the bridge across and hit up the Garlyn Zoo too and feed a bear an apple through a big tube!
You’re right! I was thinking of Lakeside and then there’s Tannery Creek next to the state park, those were the two I was thinking of.
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Side note - I’ll be in Harbor Springs (Harbor Cove) the last week of June and Petoskey the very end of July/first week if August if anyone wants to tee it up.
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Ultimately, drive time from the airport is a high-priority due to brother-in-law having a 9 mo old at that time…but I’ll look up more “up north” a bit!
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Most of those towns are normally within 30-45mins of TC airport, but if you hit summer TC traffic at the wrong time that could easily double.
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I can’t recommend the Torch Lake/Elk Lake area enough. We have a family place on Torch that we spend the majority of our time during the summer, and it’s the perfect getaway. If you’re able to sneak away for some golf, the Cedar River course at Shanty Creek is a must play.
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If you can make the trip up to Harbor Springs from Traverse City, there are also some nice homes of various sizes on the Highlands property itself. I echo getting out of Traverse to Leelanau or Torch Lake or up in Harbor Springs for a better experience.
Yep, you nailed it, Harbor Cove. Our first time staying so we will see how it goes. After looking it up, it’s not as close to Toski-Sands as I thought in my head, but still the general area. Looking forward to some whitefish spread and some Horny Monk! We’ll be there in mid-August, which is the closest we’ve been up there during busy season in many years.
We’ve stayed at Trout Creek several times and I’ve never had any complaints about the place. It’s just a little bit of a hike, it feels like we are constantly in the car coming and going from there.
I’ll be there as well. Let me know. Thanks!