Frankfort spent much of the twentieth century as a genuinely important cross-lake transportation hub, its harbor once home to a fleet of massive car ferries that hauled entire freight trains across Lake Michigan to Wisconsin ports, a service that quietly disappeared decades ago and left behind a town that has since settled into a considerably quieter identity as one of the more understated beach towns on Michigan's northwest coast. What Frankfort lacks in the boutique-lined bustle of towns like Saugatuck or Charlevoix, it makes up for with a genuinely spectacular stretch of undeveloped shoreline and one of the most photographed lighthouses in the entire state sitting just a few miles up the coast.
Point Betsie
Point Betsie Lighthouse marks the point where Lake Michigan's main body gives way to the entrance of the Manitou Passage, the channel running between the mainland and the Manitou Islands that has claimed enough ships over the centuries to justify the lighthouse's continuous operation since 1858. Its squat white tower and attached red-roofed keeper's quarters sit directly on an open, wide beach rather than perched on a rocky point, giving photographers an unusually accessible and unobstructed angle that has made it one of the most reproduced lighthouse images associated with the entire state.
Waves here can build to a genuinely dramatic scale during autumn storms, when Lake Michigan's fetch sends breakers crashing directly against the lighthouse's foundation, drawing storm-watchers who consider the sight worth braving the season's steadily dropping temperatures. In calmer summer conditions, the beach surrounding the light functions as a simple, uncrowded stretch of Lake Michigan shoreline, considerably less trafficked than the beaches of towns further south.
The Ghost of the Car Ferry Fleet
The Ann Arbor Railroad operated a fleet of substantial car ferries out of Frankfort's harbor for the better part of a century, vessels large enough to carry entire loaded rail cars across open Lake Michigan water to Wisconsin ports, a service that once made Frankfort a genuinely vital link in Midwest freight logistics rather than merely a scenic beach town. That service ended in the 1980s, and while the ferries themselves are long gone, the harbor infrastructure they required, including unusually substantial breakwaters and dock facilities for a town this size, still shapes Frankfort's waterfront and hints at a working-harbor history considerably more significant than the current quiet marina scene might suggest to a first-time visitor.
Elberta, directly across Betsie Bay from Frankfort, shared in that same ferry economy and today offers a quieter, even less developed vantage point back across the water toward Frankfort's harbor, connected by a bridge that makes exploring both sides of the bay in a single visit entirely practical.