Waverly, MI Outdoor Activities

Each year at the onset of summer, the costumed bards, knights, and royalty at Mayfaire Renaissance Festival welcome visitors to enjoy rollicking entertainment and peruse handcrafted wares throughout the wooded festival grounds. Attendees step into a world of jousters and jesters, replete with Renaissance-era songs and dances and smartphones fashioned from mutton. All-ages-appropriate comedians regale families with zany antics, and visitors can ask mystical tarot-card readers questions about the future.

Perched on the banks of Gun Lake amid several hiking trails and picnic sites, Gun Lake Rentals provides visitors with entertainment selections from its flotilla of boats and personal watercraft. The rental company carries a variety of aquatic options for satisfying thrill seekers and leisurely paddlers alike. The fleet includes jet skis and pontoon boats, as well as paddleboards and kayaks. After a full day of staying afloat on the oversized puddle, guests can seek out attractions in nearby Shelbyville, such as golf courses, miniature golf courses, horse ranches, and miniature horse ranches.

For more than 30 years, ZZ Underwater World has initiated swimmers into the world of scuba diving. Their year-round classes have taught people to safely plumb the depths of the Earth's largest seas, and their instructors are both SSI- and PADI–certified, rendering them able to certify their students and lead them on any level of dive from snorkeling to deep scuba. ZZ Underwater World's onsite shop sells snorkels and flippers among other gear from a wide range of brands, useful for people who thought Waterworld was a prophecy and are stocking up. The staff also hosts scuba vacations, taking troupes of divers to explore the wrecks of the Great Lakes or world-class destinations such as Belize or Fiji.

Woldumar Nature Center greets visitors with a coterie of trees, flowers, and grasses that populate 178 acres of diverse environs representing the region's larger ecosystem. Visitors explore the center's trails spanning 5 miles of lush scenery, which treats them to a prairie of wildflowers waving their vivid heads in the breeze, the Grand River flowing throughout 1.25 miles, and a hardwood forest that casts cool shade in the shadows of beech and maple trees. Deer peacefully forage in the apple orchard, and a butterfly garden hosts a feast for the gentle winged insects. The herb garden showcases common household herbs such as rosemary alongside oft-forgotten useful plants such as calendula, which pinky swears it goes well in potato soup. The nature center's knowledgeable staff lead educational programs year-round that fill brains with experiences in geocaching, exploring the Grand River, and watching live owl presentations.

At Double R Ranch, hikers, bikers, and horseback riders tromp across its trails, nestled next to a gentle, undulating river. Meanwhile elsewhere on the property, golfers take to a nine-hole course that sprawls alongside the ranch’s campgrounds. Families can spend an afternoon or several days taking in the verdant surroundings, where land activities such as hayrides and volleyball games meet water activities in the form of canoeing, tubing, and fishing. Overnight guests can set up camp in one of more than 100 campsites or stretch out in an A-frame chalet that boasts an electric stove, a coffeemaker, and nature’s alarm clock: a bird singing cheerily as it constructs a new split-level nest.

Since 1825, the Old Town area has seen both prosperous times and, for the second half of the 20th century, stretches of destitution. Within the last 30 years, dedicated locals have started turning Old Town back around, dropping its building vacancy rates from 90% to less than 10% and establishing a slew of festivals, art venues, and boutiques. The Old Town Commercial Association plays its role in this cultural and economic renaissance by holding the annual Old Town's Taste & Tour to raise funds for community revitalization projects.

More than 300 people attended the event in 2011, sampling bites of cuisine dished out by local restaurants. Owners of local lofts give participants a rare opportunity to tour their unique living spaces and the rooftop cannons that launch them to work each morning.