MichiGal: Vacation Day Trips: Croswell, Michigan

We did a little day-tripping during our recent vacation in Lexington, Michigan. The main road in the area is M-25, which hugs Lake Huron in many places along the way, making for a fantastically scenic route.

Croswell's "famous" swinging bridge

But our first little adventure was not on the lake at all. There is one stop light in Lexington, and if you turn east at the light you will find yourself driving toward the lake. If you turn west you will soon arrive in the town of Croswell. Besides being home to a Pioneer Sugar factory, Croswell's claim to fame is its swinging bridge. Since my childhood days of vacationing in Lexington, I have been coming to the swinging bridge. I hadn't been there in a few years, but I managed to find it. Of course I can't remember detailed directions at the moment, but I know I made one turn. There's a Ben Franklin dime store nearby. Look for signs leading you to Croswell's "famous" swinging bridge. The town is not that big and I'm absolutely certain anyone you pass would be able to point you in the right direction.

Other than the addition of a little splash pad, the park which houses the swinging bridge hasn't changed much at all since I was a kid. The splash pad is on one side of the bridge, and a little playground is on the other side. There is parking available on both sides. On the playground side, there are a couple port-a-potties. On the splash pad side, there is a proper restroom, although be warned that my mother-in-law ventured in and said it was pretty awful. There are also a few picnic tables and barbecue grills scattered around the park.

So the bridge. It's not like epic Indiana Jones style or anything, but I honestly didn't know if my kids would go on it. It does swing, and it does go over a body of water. Some of them are not terribly fond of heights. But they all crossed it and did fine, until some dumb jerk decided to be cute and start swinging it like crazy, side to side. This nonsense terrified Mathilda, and she started screaming her head off. Luckily we were near the end, so she didn't have to endure the terror for long. I couldn't even pick her up because I was afraid I would lose my balance and drop her. It looks fairly sturdy, but I don't know. And the idiot who was getting his jollies off of frightening little kids, he was not some teenager, but a grown man. Why he couldn't wait two more minutes for my family to get off the bridge, I'll never know.

We parked on the splash pad side, so our reward for crossing the bridge was a few minutes of running around at the playground. Then we crossed back over and bought ice cream from an enterprising young lady who was selling frozen treats out of a cooler attached to her bicycle. We didn't know about the splash pad, so we hadn't brought swim suits and towels along. So the kids enjoyed their ice cream, Bethany and Connor ran across the bridge one last time, and we were off.