Oh my, what a transformation is washing over the one-time Beach and Six-Pack Capital of the World.
You can feel it browsing the high-end shops and galleries of Butler Street. Cruising the Kalamazoo River past white forests-not of birch trees but of yacht masts. Paying for your room and feeling pangs of sticker shock.
Saugatuck is going upscale.
Charlevoix South.
Seventeen shops have opened in the past year. Designer labels hang from more racks than you can count. Where 10 years ago there were eight bed-and-breakfasts, now there are 26 in a town of fewer than 1,000 residents.
The new, more gentrified Saugatuck owes it all to art, says Felicia Fairchild, who does bed-and-gourmet-breakfast at the fetching Fairchild House on Butler Street, just steps from downtown.
“There’s around 14 galleries. Plus, we’re attracting more high-end professionals, more people with more disposable income.”
Sun ‘n’ fun revelers from the ’60s and ’70s won’t recognize this southwest Michigan resort town. There are coffeehouses, for heaven’s sake. Some businesses, like the tony Joyce Petter Gallery, spell out their addresses. Broward Marine builds yachts-for $1 million and up. And darned if interiors at Clearbrook Golf Club aren’t done in hunter green.
With its Victorian charm and natural endowments of dunes and water, Saugatuck’s touristic pleasures are still its raison d’etre.
Mainstreamers can still find saloons and dance halls for hell-raising. But-ask any of the straights and gays who live and work here and in neighboring Douglas-Saugatuck is marketing to a more liveried clientele. “There’s still room for the T-shirt shops,” Fairchild said, “but we’re definitely moving in the opposite direction.”
Summer began early in the city that invented it. Even before June 21, the bright shops and galleries along Butler and Water Streets were busying up.
Already, the soda fountain at Saugatuck Drugs was doing more sodas and phosphates.
Already, it was yacht gridlock in Kalamazoo River slips. With the bending river flowing through its heart and with Lake Michigan about a mile away, Saugatuck is boating nirvana.
Already, sun worshipers were out on Oval Beach, the dunes-dappled strand of sand fronting Lake Michigan. Busier, too, were the restaurants and inns, art galleries and tour boats.
A few options:
– Star of Saugatuck: Saugatuck’s dreamy setting is best savored from the decks of the Star of Saugatuck, a stern-wheel tour boat.
“Now here we are in Kalamazoo Lake,” said Capt. Bob, “which is little more than a wide spot in the Kalamazoo River.”
Capt. Bob pilots us past cottages and condos, forests and wetlands, sand dunes and cruisers from the plainest runabout to some of the sleekest yachts this side of Chicago.
A 90-minute ride serves up plenty of Saugatuck, such as:
Wicks Park, a shady gazebo park popular for riverside concerts.
Coral Gables, a good-times emporium for dining, dancing and live music.
The big lake. Weather permitting, Star sails out into Lake Michigan, where, to the chorus of a foghorn, passengers take in the dunes panorama. Michigan the lake meets Michigan the state at these frozen waves of sand.
A sandy crest called Mt. Baldhead, crowned by a proud (if paint-peeling) Saugatuck landmark: an old radar dome. Take the wooden stairs up Mt. Baldy only if you want to climb 282 heart-pounding steps for a view mostly obliterated by trees.
– Singapore: Singapore, Mich., won’t show up on highway maps-but it’s there, all right. A mid-1800s lumber town beside Lake Michigan, Singapore boomed until there were no trees left to cut and the city was abandoned.
Now Singapore lies under shifting sand dunes. For tour boat captains cruising the canal from the Kalamazoo River out to Lake Michigan, Singapore rates a few lines of narration. But no one focuses for long on a barren, windswept mound, and Singapore is left to sleep in its sandy tomb.
– S.S. Keewatin: Maybe Michigan’s best-known Canadian retiree! Until 1965, the Canadian Pacific Railway steamship carried passengers and freight between Georgian Bay and the north shore of Lake Superior.
Now her huge hulk rests on a far bank of Lake Kalamazoo as a floating maritime museum-the last of the classic Great Lakes steamers.
To go aboard is to float back in time to the turn of the century, when a Great Lakes cruise epitomized unhurried grace and elegance.
Imagine grand stairways, dancers swirling in the ballroom, elegant meals in the dining room, deal-making in the Men’s Smoking Lounge. Carpeting, Italian windows, mahogany trim and hanging plants recall the gilded era of steamship travel.
Guided tours pause at cabins and staterooms, then ascend to the top deck and the wheelhouse.
The telegraph is set on “Stop.” Don’t believe it. The Keewatin’s engines are forever silent, but thanks to entrepreneur Roland Peterson, who saved her from the scrap yard, the Kee lives in happy retirement.
Imagine how dance band music, crew chatter and other piped-in sounds would enhance a tour.
– Saugatuck dune rides: Is it the nostalgia that seems to pour from every tree-shaded park, every white clapboard house? Something about Saugatuck creates urges to do the things you did as a kid.
Like that cherished Michigan vacation tradition known as the dune buggy ride. Saugatuck dune rides have been around for 40 years. A highballing ride in a dunes schooner brings wide-eyed wonderment to kids-and tremulous anxiety to grown-ups.
“My granddaughter is trying to kill me,” said Rosalie Russo of Clinton Township, Mich., her hands glued to the grip bar in a front row, where the ride is smoother. “I hope we don’t stall on the dunes.”
Ashley Aspiranti, 8, of Sterling Heights, Mich., sat beside Russo, eager to ride. “I’ve gone before,” said Ashley’s mom, Linda, “and every time I hate having to do this.”
Aboard the converted pickup truck we swooped around curves, fishtailed in the sand, flew up and down hills-and stalled a few times. “There’ll be no charge for your new hairdos,” announced our driver, Chris Cleborne.
Our sandy safari was more scenic than thrilling, especially deep in a cooling forest of beech trees and hemlock and high atop overlooks where we could see for miles.
Parts like the “Bridge Out” sign and legs planted knees-down in the sands were groaners. But mostly we learned about vegetation, wildlife and-under that dune-Singapore.
Our 35-minute scamper got perhaps the highest praise possible from an 8-year-old. “It’s more fun than Cedar Point (amusement park),” Ashley said.
DUNE RIDES, GOLF AND MORE
Saugatuck is a two-hour drive from Chicago. Among attractions mentioned in this story:
– S.S. Keewatin. Tours 10:30-4:30 daily. 616-857-2107.
– Saugatuck Dune Rides. Rides 9-5 daily. $9 adults, $6 ages 10 and under. 616-857-2253.
– Star of Saugatuck. Ninety-minute cruises several times daily. $7 for adults, $4 for ages 3-12, free for 2 and under. 616-857-4261.
– Clearbrook Golf Club: 18-hole greens fees $24 per person weekdays, $29 Friday-Sunday, carts extra. 616-857-2000.
– Other attractions include lifeboat cruises, dinner cruises, $1 Saugatuck-Douglas-Holland shuttle rides on the blue-and-gray coaches of the Interurban, fine art and special exhibitions at the Joyce Petter Gallery on the Blue Star Highway-and Beery Field, antiques shops and the quiet calm of Douglas.
For details: Saugatuck-Douglas Convention and Visitors Bureau, P.O. Box 28, Saugatuck, Mich. 49453; 616-857-1701.
