Antrim Creek Natural Area – June 20, 2015
On our second morning camping at Barnes County Park we drove 5 miles north to visit Antrim Creek Natural Area.
Antrim Creek Natural Area is a 156 acre preserve that is owned by the county and managed by The Grand Traverse Regional Land Conservancy. This may be the only place you will find a mile of undeveloped beach on Grand Traverse Bay.
We started our hike at the north entrance trailhead, because it was the first entrance that we came to on the drive in. We later found that most visitors use the south entrance and take the short walk along the creek down to the beach.
The Antrim Creek NA trail map.
From the parking area we headed down the Nipissing (green) Trail.
The trail runs just inland from the bay, but other than one overlook the water is not visible for most of the way.
The Dune Overlook.
We found that the trails were well marked with colored posts.
Nearing the end of the Nipissing Trail.
After 0.4 miles the Nipissing Trail intersects the Creek Tail. We took a right and walked down to the beach.
The beach here is a mixture of sand, mud and dune grass. The kids had a good time exploring the sandbars and ponds at the mouth of the creek.
Looking north along the beach.
Antrim Creek.
After checking out the beach we backtracked on the first section of the Creek Trail and then continued on to the South Parking Area.
After using the pit toilets by the South Entrance we started heading back along the Trillium Ridge Trail.
The first section skirts along the edge of a clearing.
This trail follows the edge of a ridge with some nice views of the lower section that we hiked out on.
As the trail drops down of the ridge, it runs through an interesting section of thick cedar trees.
The trail ends on the North Entrance Road. From here it is just a short walk back down the road to complete the loop.
Contrary to what you would think, the higher Trillium Ridge Trail had a few muddy sections.
We walked down to the beach by the north parking area and Regan looked down found a Petoskey Stone right away.
After this discovery the search was on. We found one other small stone and then it was time to head back to camp for lunch.
The hike was an easy 2 miles that took less than an hour of moving time to complete. Although, we spent 2 hours here exploring the beach at each end of the preserve. We thought Antrim Creek Natural Area was a nice little hike and worth checking out if you are in this area.
Directions to the Antrim Creek Natural Area north entrance >>
More on Antrim Creek Natural Area: MichiganTrailMaps.com
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