In August, I had the opportunity to take a girl's trip with my mom to Michigan. As a fellow traveler and adventurist, I didn't have to twist her arm very hard to get her to come with me to the sand dunes of Michigan. I am pretty sure she just intended to watch me make a fool of myself trying to conquer the dunes...
Which I did...
But little did Mom know I had plans for her too.
She had celebrated the half-century mark and was recovering from a torn Achilles tendon, but that is another story... nevertheless she was likely going to sit this one out.
Silver Lake Sand Dune Coordinates
43.6886° N, 86.3855° W
Getting To Silver Lake Sand Dunes
We navigated the back roads to Mears, Michigan. I don’t know what the heck my GPS was set to, but Google Maps sure wanted my mother and me to soak in all the sights Michigan offered.
Now, when you are planning on going to some sand dunes to go Sandboarding, you think desert scene, right? Welp, I was absolutely wrong. True to its namesake there was a lake. And I am not saying a small lake people. I am talking about a flipping huge lake, nearly 700 acres. Yet, what was blowing my mind was that on one side of the lake was your usual lake resorts, boat rentals, and well-off homes. On the other side was straight up endless sand. The average sand dune shoots up to the height of an 8-story tall building. With a couple of thousand acres of endless sand, it stretched further than I could see.
I recovered faster than my mom. I caught a glimpse of her with her mouth hanging open in awe. Any thoughts she had about sitting this one out were dwindling.
Renting Sandboards
Since we don’t have massive sand dunes where we live (South Dakota isn’t known for it anyways) buying them was out of the question. So, we (yes, we – I was chipping away at Mom’s hard pass to try sandboarding) rented our boards from Wave Club Water Sport Rentals. One board for an hour set me back a whopping 10 bucks for an hour/each. The folks helping us were quite kind and assured me that if we brought the boards back close to the hour mark, we wouldn't be charged extra. The board itself looked like an archaic snowboard. It had soft bindings and a slight edge to it, but nothing earth-shattering as far as sports technology goes. I guess I don’t know what I was expecting, but a wooden-like board definitely wasn't it.
We grabbed the boards and tossed them into the back seat of our car rental. I dashed inside the shop and changed into a two-piece sports swimming suit that I lap swim in and pulled up a pair of board shorts and a tank top.
Traveler Tip: I've seen pictures online of peeps sandboarding in bikinis, but the thought of wiping out on the sand and dusting off grainy sand from a flesh-wound (especially in a place that shorts cover) wasn't my idea of fun. The Wave Club Water Sport Rentals does have a shop and a restroom area to change attire.
Adventurer Tip: One of the workers at the shop threw in a wax block, quickly educating me that the more wax I rubbed on to the bottom of the board the faster I'd go. It might be intimidating to put a lot of wax on the board. Trust me, you need to lather that baby up with all sorts of wax if you want to get anywhere.
Silver Lake Sand Dunes Park Entrance
There was a short drive to the entrance of the park, just up the road if you follow the lake. There is a parking fee of nearly $30 to park your vehicle. Since board rental was so cheap, this wasn't bad but just more annoying that we were getting nickeled and dimed for parking. It might have been different if there were beautiful amenities or picnic areas, but the place legit was a small parking lot with a portable bathroom.
But we weren't here to take in the sights of the parking lot.
Climbing To The Top Of The Sand Dunes
There were steep wooden stairs that jetting up quickly. Now, I consider myself to be pretty in shape, especially so because I have a love/hate relationship with my gym's stepmill, but I was sucking air. Hard. To make the climb more interesting, there was sand everywhere.
Now, you may be thinking, Sarah, your 50-year-old-ish mother with the recovering Achilles tendon tear is dying behind you! Why are you talking about flipping sand right now! You should be helping her!
Welp, I tried. We stopped as often on the "wooden steps" as often as we could but the suckers were basically buried by the dunes. If you think you track in sand from the beach, it didn’t hold a candle to the overblown steps at Silver Lake Sand Dunes.
Once we cleared the stairs, we took a good beat at the bottom of the dunes to catch our breath.
We had barely begun our trek to the top of the dunes.
Destination Point: Old Baldy
Our destination? Old Baldy. This dune is about 93 feet above the lake level, making it a slow climb up. Traveler tip: bring a backpack with water. I had a water bottle I carried. But with that, the wax block and the board in tow, it made the climb more difficult than necessary.
I don't know how long it took to climb that sucker, but I figured between the drive and the initial climb, most of our hour rental had been eaten up. Luckily, the folks at the shop rental didn’t bust our chops for turning in late.
Overlooking The Sand Dunes @ Silver Lake
The sight at the top of Old Baldy was epic. Living in SoDak, there is something magical about this oversized sandbox full of adult toys. The same place that rents out sandboard also does dune buggies, bikes, paddleboards, etc. You could burn an entire weekend rolling around in the sand and have just a blast. #sandblast <- see what I did there?
Sandboarding Isn’t Close To Snowboarding
Anyways, the folks said I could board with sandals, but it didn’t take long to '86 them. Since I frequented the slopes in the winter, I figured snowboarding would translate well to sandboarding. It didn't.
It was harder to get going and had to keep inching myself forward. The more annoyed I got, the more wax I used. Sometime during my grumblings and wax rubbings, I met the magical ratio of wax and sheer determination to get down that flipping dune.
I wiped out 3 times...But I was having a BLAST!
The Art Of Sandboarding
All the frustration trying to move the dumb wooden board on the top of the sand quickly finished as I picked up speed. As I said, I wiped out 3 times on the first go-around. Fortunately, the bindings were a glorified strap so it was fairly easy to bailout.
By the time I reached the bottom I was hooked! I wanted to sandboard for hours. But what was even cooler than experiencing this hottest summer sport was watching Mom step onto her board and ride down the top part of the dune like a boss.
Date Sarah (AND HER MOM) First Checked off SANDBOARDING from her Bucket List: August 9, 2019
Moderate!
