I’ve been holding out on you. I spent a morning wandering around the Elk Rapids Harbor the day the first and second boats went into their slips. There’s always a lot of work to be done in spring to get ready for the season, but there was no sense of hurry on a perfect morning. Just people tending to things they know how to do well. Easing the boats in. Making this little repair and that on the docks. Fishing. And off beyond the fishing platforms, the Dam Beach waited for summer.
The Dam Beach has its own spot in the hearts of everyone who grew up in Elk Rapids. It has the distinction of being the local beach, as opposed to the tourist beaches. It’s simple. There are no amenities beyond a couple of picnic tables. Walk there in your flipflops, spread a towel on the sand, eat your sandwich. Then of course you have to wait an hour before you can go in. Make a sand castle while you wait. Persuade your mother the hour is up. OK, well, you can go in to wade, but you can’t actually swim for another 15 minutes. Run down to the shore and splash in up to your knees. Shriek because it’s cold. Laugh because it’s wonderful. Splash your brother. It must be time now. Hold your nose and plunge all the way in. It’s summer.
There was a move awhile ago to gild the lily. Add paved parking and restrooms and walkways. I don’t know what-all. People were incensed. They rose up in a mighty wave and said NO!!!! The went to meetings and appeared in parades wearing shirts that said Save the Dam Beach. They have, for the moment, prevailed.
There is a lot of history in this spot. Old wooden pilings reach out into the Bay, marking the place where the steamers used to dock. First they came bringing commerce and carrying away the products of industry. Later they brought the first tourists. Traces of the industrial past remain, beginning with the dam itself. Off in the distance, the harbor fills with the pleasure boats that bring summer visitors these days. In front of you the Bay sparkles, or tosses, depending. Beyond it Old Mission Peninsula reaches north into the Big Lake. The lake itself seems eternal. And you have your place in the great sweep, sitting here on the sand where you have planted yourself.
Torch Lake Views 
P.j. grath
May 17, 2011
It must have been the sunshine. We could have waved to each other across the water! Glad to hear the people have managed to keep it simple at the Dam Beach. Keep it simple, keep it slow. Well, you know me, Gerry.
Gerry
May 17, 2011
I was waving! I thought that was you waving back!
Yup. Simple and slow, that’s me.
Anna
May 17, 2011
Gosh, I envy you have a beach like that. I could spend a lot of time there where I would just sit and be with nature. I’d love to feel the sand between my toes and even build a sandcastle. I’d love to listen to the lake. Love the photos… picturesque. You live in quite the distinct and lovely area.
Gerry
May 17, 2011
Thank you Anna. We like it a whole lot. You should grab Preston and Moppet, pile in the truck, and come visit. Michigan does summer well.
Fee
May 17, 2011
There’s a little beach we go to in East Lothian – unknown if you’re not a local – where we spent many a happy childhood afternoon. It, too, has a sense of history, a reminder of time gone by.
As kids, we climbed on the same concrete ‘tank traps’ that my girls scraped their knees on. My dad’s uncle served in the army and had a part in covering Britain’s beaches with these muckle lumps of concrete.
Gerry
May 17, 2011
Exactly. These places have the kind of history that’s in our bones. We knew that even when we were kids–knew that our stories were there, and that we were part of something that started before we did. (I suspect we did not think in terms of something that would go on after us . . . )
Molly
May 17, 2011
I (heart) the dam beach.
Even though I didn’t grow up in Elk Rapids.
For all the reasons you say.
Gerry
May 17, 2011
We must get you a t-shirt. And maybe a little vial of sand to carry with you to furrin parts.
Joss
May 18, 2011
You’ve painted a wonderful picture of this place. I like how you show in broad brush strokes the history of the place. I love detail (which is why I like reading the New York Review of Books). I would have liked you to say exactly what little repairs the boat-owners were carrying out. But I guess you’d have to get Mr Uhdd’s advice for the right technical jargon! (Sorry I sound so teacher-ish, but it’s exam time here right now.)
Gerry
May 18, 2011
Don’t apologize–especially not when you’ve clearly read what I wrote with interest and attention. (Writers were always that kid who would do just about anything for attention.) I was thinking myself that I needed to improve that bit with concrete details, but I was lazy and I never know how much patience people will have with a longish post anyway. You are right. Particularly as the men doing the work should have credit.
They aren’t the boat owners–those will come later, and will not wear Carhartts or navy thermal shirts. These guys maintain the marina, examining every square inch of the boat docks, fastening the decking in place with long screws, making sure the whole thing is safe and tidy before The Season begins. They do a good job. Elk Rapids is justifiably proud of its Harbor.
Dawn
May 18, 2011
….sigh… so lovely, what a nice tribute to a peaceful beach.
Gerry
May 18, 2011
I’m glad you liked it, Dawn. Come up and enjoy it any time.
Scott Thomas Photography
May 18, 2011
I bet there is some history here. You going to tell us someday? 😉
Ah, no matter what, the Earth keeps going around it’s orbit and summer will come. Your photos show much promise of that.
Gerry
May 18, 2011
Sooner or later I am going to tell you the history of practically everything around here! I’m working on my submission to the Scott Thomas Hometown History Assignment, but it won’t be about the harbor or the dam beach. No indeed . . .
Kathy
May 18, 2011
Don’t you love those peaceful mornings (or afternoons, or evenings) when everything feels so hushed and beautiful? A respite in our busy days…and one that usually leads us longing for more moments like these.
Gerry
May 18, 2011
I do. I also, um, like watching other people work. I find it very restful.
Pat
May 22, 2011
Gerry, I just have to chime in on a couple of things here. The name of the harbor on the bay, IN Elk Rapids is The Edward C. Grace Memorial Harbor. I know it can be a lot of letters on a computer but only 14 more strokes to get it RIGHT. If you’re on the bay and look for the Elk Rapids Harbor on any maps, you WON’T find it.
On the MAN MADE beach behind the dam. Yes, man made. It didn’t exist 50 years ago. There is no place to park when the fish are in. It’s only accesible, the way it is, to just a few LOCAL people. And than if you only have young legs. But people don’t like to improve anything in Elk Rapids, they just want to stay the way they were. If my Father had thought that way, there would not be the #1 Harbor on the Lake Michigan side of Michigan. Making lots of money for the people of Elk Rapids.
You hit a couple of sore spots with me and I feel like I had to say something.
Great pictures.
Gerry
May 22, 2011
Now see, I was just saying to someone how it frustrates me when people drop in and say “Great pictures!” I always suspect that they did not read the post. Now here you are saying Great pictures–OK, without the exclamation point (what, you didn’t think they deserved the exclamation point?)–and yet I must admit you read the post.
OK, on the question of what to call the harbor in Elk Rapids: I do know the full name, but I decline to write it that way, for the reason that people do not talk that way and above all because people who read this blog will suspect me of being a wise-ass–which I am, but that’s another post entirely. From hereon out, I will call it the Elk Rapids harbor, in lower case, and leave it to readers to figure out where it might be. (But when Harbor Days comes around, I will capitalize that.)
Anyone who is out on Grand Traverse Bay without appropriate charts and is seeking advice about harbors from Torch Lake Views has already made so many errors in judgment that we do not even need to discuss it.
On the question of the Dam Beach, we will have to agree to disagree. I don’t think the problem is that there is no place to park when the fish are in. I think the problem is that resort towns never have “enough” parking for the height of the season, and then have to maintain “too much” during the off season.
Not all change is progress, and money is not the measure of all things.
Anyway, you’re always welcome to holler ouch when a sore spot is hit. Miss Sadie, the Cowboy and I can take it, especially as you imply that we have young legs and that we might be considered locals in Elk Rapids. We are immeasurably flattered on both counts.