Sleeping Bear Dunes

Named after an Ojibwe legend: a mother bear and two cubs fled a forest fire by swimming Lake Michigan. The cubs drowned from exhaustion; the mother waited on the bluffs. The Great Spirit created North and South Manitou Islands in their memory. An alternative Anishinaabe story, 'The Great Muckwah,' tells of a violent bear menacing coastal villages until a young maiden puts it to sleep with a potion.