Brewery Tour by Canoe: Boardman Lake, Traverse City, MI

Boardman Lake is smack-dab downtown in Traverse City, MI. Easily accessible from the lake are three, maybe even four breweries. Local kayak liveries have scheduled tours to kayak and bike to several local breweries and taprooms. So on this August Sunday, StringGrrl and I decided that we should make the tour ourselves.

Coffee first! It would be irresponsible to embark on day drinking un-caffeinated

Boardman Lake Trail Bridge and entry to the River

There is a free public launch in Hull Park, just behind the Traverse Area Public Library. Parking adequate for up to 5 cars and up to 5 trucks with trailers, right near the launch and more parking elsewhere in the park made for an easy launch that morning. We paddled our way into the river first to have a coffee while drifting through town. Ideally, one should be able to portage the canoe past the dam and connect directly into Grand Traverse Bay, but construction near the dam made that portage just inconvenient enough that StringGrrl and I did not bother.

A pint at Rare Bird

To visit Rare Bird, you can tie your canoe or kayak to the docks behind the condominiums between Cass and Eighth Streets, that is the boardwalk you will see between the 2 road overpasses you will come to while on the Boardman River and before you reach the dam. From there it is a simple walk up the steps through the parking areas for the condos and over to Rare Bird Brewing.

Canoe tied to the Boardman Lake Trail Scenic Pier and Kayak Launch

The overlook from Boardman Lake Trail

After a brief few drinks at Rare Bird, we returned to our canoe and paddled southwest from the Boardman River to the western banks of the Boardman Lake and found a conveniently placed pier and launch to tie-up to and leave the boat to visit Right Brain Brewing.

This deer climbed down from the hillside into the Lake for a drink and light salad

After we had beers at Right Brain, we returned to the lake with intention to paddle back and call it a day. At that time we did not know that another brewery opened not too far from the southern side of the lake. Nocturnal Bloom, had opened a few weeks before our trip there and one could potentially park a boat near the River Outfitters on the south shore of Boardman and make a short walk to the brewery, but we did not know and can't vouch for how easy that might be. The lake is very very shallow at that end of the lake and might not be navigable under all conditions.

One notable thing about this weekend in Traverse City was the air quality. Wildfires in Western Ontario and Manitoba, Canada, had dropped a fairly heavy blanket of smoky haze onto the northern parts of lower peninsula Michigan. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, but still the sun was not clearly visible this afternoon. The panorama shot below highlights how half of the sky was pea soup thick with haze and the rest of the sky was smoky blue.