Mount Pleasant Summer Adventure
When we started planning a summer visit to Mount Pleasant, Michigan we knew we wanted to revisit a few places we had been to during spring. The Chippewa River runs through the area and has multiple access points that we planned on visiting along with some new places to eat in Mount Pleasant.
We started off visiting Deerfield Nature Park. We had been here before in Spring and the experience was much different between the two seasons. We started with a paddle on the Chippewa River. During the summer months the water was moving a bit slower than spring so we were easily able to paddle in both directions. This river offers multiple access points throughout the area and staging vehicles for downriver paddles could be something we look at doing in the future. There may also need to be a few portages throughout the journey. Overall, our paddle here was a lot of fun in both spring and summer.
Next up, we got off of our boards to hike the trails. We had a destination of a covered bridge and also a suspension bridge and we made it to both. The covered bridge is photogenic so we stopped to capture a few photos.
There is one additional special part of this park and that is the two disc golf courses. These are two of the nicest courses that we have played and each season really changes the look of the course. The two 18- hole courses are called Deerfield and Wildwood and we like that playing the courses also feels a lot like a hike. The Deerfield course opened in 2009 and the Wildwood course opened in 2013. We really appreciate the scorecards available and the well marked holes and tee boxes. Disc golf is a fun and inexpensive way to get into spending more time outside!
We also wanted to make sure to spend time right in Mt. Pleasant because in the spring we biked along the Chippewa River through 6 different parks and we had planned out a paddle we wanted to do. We started at Nelson park and paddled around Island Park, which as the name suggests, is an actual island right in Mt. Pleasant. The park itself has a skate park, basketball courts, pickeball and tennis courts, softball fields, a splash pad and more. The paddled brought you past all of that and it is a really cool setting.
We had some food plans for our visit. First off, we were told we should check out Dog Central. This hot dog place had awesome signature and classic hot dog options as well as great fries. One thing that really stood out was how great the staff was workin in Dog Central that day. That goes a long ways for a good experience!
As you may know, we also like to find a great coffee shop everywhere we go. We have our style of coffee shop and often know right when we walk in the door if it will be good, average or not so good. Ponder Coffee Company fit the vibe check for what we thought would be a good coffee and we were right. Beyond the nice indoor area, the outside patio in the social district was a nice addition for the warmer months.
Another food and beverage stop for us was Mountain Town Station. When we walked in we passed the pizza oven so we knew that was going to be part of what we tried. We went with the Great Smokey Mts., a bbq chicken pizza. A bbq chicken pizza is often the go-to when its on the menu. The pizza was great but so was the Railyard Raspberry Wheat. It was the perfect beverage to enjoy while hanging out on the patio.
We had a great time visiting Mt. Pleasant and next time you are in the area for a CMU football game, a concert at Soaring Eagle, or just for your own adventure, these are good stops along the way!
Our full video from Mount Pleasant is below!