Lake St. Clair and the Nautical Mile

Macomb County’s whole eastern edge is Lake St. Clair — a big, shallow freshwater lake that sits between Michigan and Canada and links two of the Great Lakes, Huron and Erie. It’s often called “the Heart of the Great Lakes,” and even though it isn’t one of the five official Great Lakes, it’s one of the busiest boating waters in the Midwest. The lake is a fishing legend: it’s been ranked one of the best smallmouth bass lakes in the world and the top muskie lake in North America — the big, toothy fish that anglers travel from all over to chase. In fact, by the state’s own estimate, nearly a third of all the sport fish caught across the entire Great Lakes come out of this one lake. The heart of the boating scene is the Nautical Mile, a stretch of Jefferson Avenue in St. Clair Shores packed with marinas and waterfront restaurants and — by its own count — the biggest concentration of boats in the Midwest. St. Clair Shores leaned into it so hard that it calls itself the “Boating Capital of Michigan.” Up and down the shore, towns like Harrison Township and New Baltimore have their own marinas, parks, and lakefront downtowns.

The Nautical Mile keeps its events calendar at nauticalmile.org.