In our October blog, Sleeping Bear Dunes Visitor Numbers May Not Break Records, National Park officials were predicting that the summer of 2011 would only be the second-busiest summer on record. This week the LeelanauNews.com reported that October 2011 was a record breaker.

DH Day Barns First Autumn Light (Photo by Mark S. Carlson)

Over one thousand visitors came to the park in October, which is a 19 percent increase over 2010 visitor numbers, according to the National Park Service. The jump in October visitors was not enough to break the record for the entire year; 2011 still looks like it will be only the second highest year-to-date total in the park’s 41 year history. It is still too early to tell whether November and December will have an effect on the year as a whole.

Park officials say that wonderful fall weather and an extended and brilliant color season were the reason for the increased numbers. It is also unclear whether the special recognition Sleeping Bear Dunes received from ABC’s Good Morning America’s, “Most Beautiful Place in America” award had any effect.

Local business in Glen Arbor and Empire also reported record numbers of people in the area. Read the full LeelanauNews.com article, Fans Flock to Lakeshore.

Blog by Ileana Habsburg-Snyder

Tags: national park visitor numbers, october 2011 national park visitors, sleeping bear dunes visitor numbers

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 29th, 2011 at 1:57 pm and is filed under News, Sleeping Bear Dunes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.