Fall Color Tour Time! 

Top 5 places (and maybe a few more) to take great Fall color photos

Fall is my favorite time of year. I love watching the rainbow of colors change from day to day. Science says that water and temperature determine when a tree’s leaves turn colors. I don’t much care for the reason; I just love it.

In Newaygo County, we have some of the best places to see the color. I’ve been known to visit a couple of places every few days to take photos of just the right time to get maximum color. I’ve decided that every day is the best day. It just makes me smile and feel grounded.

These are some of my favorite places to see the color and get great photographs:

1. High Rollaway Park on M-82, east of Newaygo and west of Thornapple Avenue. The platform along the back has a great vista of the northern Newaygo County landscape with the colors displayed. If you go after the first frost, you can get a better view of the Muskegon River in your shot.
2. Tunnel of Trees Award– We have several roads that could rival the famed highway by Traverse City. My favorite is Basswood Drive south of 40^thStreet (just off M-37). Beware that this is gravel road and might have a few washboard spots and can get a little narrow in places, but the trees reach up and over the road coming together in a seamless riot of color. While Basswood is my favorite, many other roads offer similar viewing such is Elm heading east from Croton-Hardy Drive.
3. Camp Newaygo’s Wetland Trail is on Centerline just north of the entrance. This boardwalk has a floating platform on a small lake that has great colors. Also going out over the swamp offers unique colors and textures as well.
4. Kropscott Farm Environmental Center, 6523 W. Baseline Road (west of Stone Road), north of Fremont, may be recognized from local newscasts. As the highest point for miles, this view offers fields and forests offering contrasting colors that aren’t just trees. Make that photo look like fall with corn or wheat fields adding order to the splotches of tree colors.
5. Riverfront Park– Specifically along Water Street just off M-37 in downtown Newaygo. Between the interest of the railroad bridge, the small waterfall from Penoyer Creek and the color of the trees along the riverbank, it is hard to pick a focal point for that perfect fall picture.

These are just my top 5 choices of go-to spots to check out the color. I haven’t even touched on others like Croton or Hardy Dams, Rotary Park in White Cloud, the North Country Trail by Nichols or Walkup lakes or Minnie Pond or any of the many parks along the Muskegon and White Rivers. Feel free to drop a comment and share your favorite spot!

by Wendy Sinicki