Kyle+Kantola


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Kyle Kantola Mr. Konett, 5th 3/23/11 My Life at the Muskegon State Park Since I was 8 one of my favorite places I’ve ever been was the Muskegon State Park. It was about 1250 acres of really long trails to hike on, sandy dunes, a long beach, and a peer to fish off of. For the first 8 years of my life i lived only a few miles from the park and my family would go all the time. Any day where it was too hot to stay inside or we felt like taking a hike, we would head out there. 

The best days for swimming were when the waves were really high. When I was 8 some of the waves would be over my head. The 70 degree water was usually seemed really cold when you got in at first but after you went under the water we would be used to it. My brothers and I would swim out until just before the waves would start to curl over and we would body surf. Body surfing is when you kind of use your body as a surf board and ride waves back toward the shore. As the wave tries to curl over it pushes your body up and toward while the wave carries you really fast. Usually when you stop moving you turn and realize that you went a lot further than it felt like. The best days were when there was a red flag at the lake. That is a sign to put up to tell you that the lake is dangerous. Those days the waves would be the highest and the fastest which made them the most fun for us.

It wasn’t just a place for the summer though. In the winter the dunes would transform into huge, white hills of snow. At the most common place that we would sled, we called the sugar bowl. There was 3 big hills that all went down to about the same place and kind of resembled a bowl. There were a few smaller paths that you could sled down on the sides that came from the hiking trails. These paths were sometimes much steeper, they had trees down the sides and weren’t intended for sledding down. My older brother rode down once and ran straight into a tree and got a sliver in his eye. After that, we Stayed in the areas with much less trees.



In the fall and spring we liked to go on hikes on the hills around the park. We would bring our old chocolate lab along with us too. Me and my brothers would leave the path every once in a while and check under rocks for blue-spotted salamanders. Right when you would pick the rock up we would see them scurry of and disappear under a pile of leaves or grass. On of the best parts of any hike was when you got to the top of the highest hill there. There was a little bench at the top that my parents would sit down. On one side of the hill there was a wide path of sand that would go all the way down. I would always race my brothers and my dog down the sand. Sometimes I would run down the hill faster them my legs would take me and i would tumble the rest of the way down. We always had a great time doing this and after we left, we would always try to get our parents to bring us back as soon as possible.  Every time we go to Muskegon, at any time of the year, we always try to go to the park. We all have many great memories of the place and I expect to have many more.