The Lower Peninsula's biggest state park is right here

Tucked into the northeast corner of Jackson County is the largest state park in all of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula: the Waterloo Recreation Area. It sprawls across roughly 20,000 acres of woods, wetlands, and rolling hills left behind by the glaciers, spilling over into neighboring Washtenaw County between Jackson and Ann Arbor.

There’s a lot packed into it. Eleven lakes, four campgrounds (including spots for horse campers and backpackers), swimming beaches, and more than fifty miles of trails for hiking, mountain biking, and horseback riding — including a long backcountry route, the Waterloo-Pinckney Trail. A state Recreation Passport on your license plate gets your car in. A good first stop is the Gerald E. Eddy Discovery Center, with hands-on exhibits about the area’s Ice Age geology and wildlife; it’s run by the Michigan DNR at 17030 Bush Road in Chelsea.