Favorite Places
If you’ve spent much time wandering in Michigan’s Outdoors you’ve no doubt came across a place you call your own. It’s one of those special places where things just feel right. It might be a place where you’ve been successful in a hunting adventure, or maybe you found a hat full of morels, what ever the reason that place forever holds a spot in your memory.
I have 3 such spots and thoughts of them brings a smile to my face and puts me in a better frame of mind. The first one is in Roscommon County, near Houghton Lake. It’s an out of the way place deep in the Federal Forest, one of those you need a compass to find. It a small trickle of a stream winding it’s way through some towering pines. Always cool and damp there, lots of wildlife too. This particular spot I found while turkey hunting with my dad. We had just returned from a big breakfast and very soon after setting up our decoys for a bit of calling, we both fell sound asleep. Not sure exactly how long we slept, but I do vividly remember how we awoke!! A big long bearded tom woke us both with a loud rumbling gobble as he stood 30 feet away looking at our hen decoy. To say we were startled would be an understatement. However not quite startled enough to keep from sending a load of 6 shot his way and later after many pictures, putting him in our cooler.
Second spot is another out of the way place in Gratiot County on some state land. Dad and I have hunted that spot for over 30 years and taken numerous bucks from an old log blind we built many years ago. Between him and I I’m sure we’ve seen the dawn break at least a hundred times in that patch of woods. The old blind is just a pile of rotted logs on the ground, and dad has gone on to the big hunting grounds in the sky. My son and I just went back to this place last gun season and I’m happy to say it still has it’s charm.
Last place is a favorite stretch of the Platte River in northwest Michigan. Nice stretch of spawning gravel, with a few deeper holes scattered about, and a couple cabins. I’ve fished that spot nearly every spring for 30+ years. I’ve caught and lost more steelhead there than I can remember. Just one of those places where I’ve watched the rituals of spring unfold in the great outdoors. Crisp and cool in the morning, maybe a little ice in the rod guides. Then the ole sun pops out and things warm a bit, brings out the chickadees, nuthatches, and blue jays. There were a couple times we hit that spot at the right time and wound up getting to watch the courtship rituals of the woodcock. AHHH…….Springtime!!!
As an ole friend says on TV…….Get outdoors here’s no better place to be!!
Posted: February 19th, 2010.
Comment from Spanky
Time February 21, 2010 at 1:21 am
Oh yeah, Marion Springs, enjoyed 18 straight years out of 19 deer hunting there! The 19th year there was too many hunters, almost shot one of them so I left for Hale. But I may return there for bow season or maybe muzzle loader next year.