Northport, the lighthouse, and the tip of the peninsula

At the top of the Leelanau Peninsula sits Northport, a village wrapped around a snug harbor on Grand Traverse Bay. It was one of the county’s first settlements. Reverend George Smith and Chief Peter Waukazoo’s community settled here in 1849, and the village was platted as Northport in 1854. It was also Leelanau’s original county seat. Today it’s a friendly yachting town. You’ll find a marina, parks, a golf course, beaches, and a downtown of shops and restaurants.

Eight miles farther north, at the very tip of Michigan’s “little finger,” is Leelanau State Park and the Grand Traverse Lighthouse. First lit in the 1850s, the lighthouse guided ships through the Manitou Passage for generations. Now it’s a museum you can tour. The state park’s beaches, trails, and Petoskey-stone hunting are all around it. Down the east shore is tiny Omena, on its own quiet bay. This was the “New Mission” that Reverend Peter Dougherty and the Ahgosa band founded in 1852, when they crossed the bay from Old Mission. The little 1858 mission church still stands.

For buyers, this end of the peninsula is quiet, scenic, and a bit remote — about a half-hour from Traverse City. There’s bay frontage, orchard and vineyard land, and wooded acreage. Northport itself offers in-town living around the harbor. Homes outside the village are on wells and septic (see the well-and-septic note).