The 2,182-acre Indiana Dunes State Park offers a bucolic blend of beaches, coastline, and miles of hiking trails which wander through woods dotted with ferns and wildflowers like white and pink trilliums and jack-in-the-pulpits.

Here are towering sand dunes to climb for vast panoramas of the coastlines of three states: Michigan, Indiana and Illinois.

In the early evening, as the sunset turns the waters and sands sherbet colors of pink and orange, the Chicago skyline looms large (admittedly, so do the nearer steel mills of Gary and East Chicago).

In the spring time, the Great Blue Herons return to their rookery at the Indiana State Dunes to repair their nests. Though by mid May the blossoming trees hide their nesting area, the herons, long legged with graceful wings, can be seen searching for fish at the water's edge well into the fall.