Why the Sunsets Are Like That — a stop on M-22 South.
If you can arrange your day so that you are on this shore in the evening, do it — because Michigan's west coast has a genuine, physical claim to the best sunsets in the eastern United States, and there is a reason.
It is geometry first. You are on the EAST shore of a very large body of water, facing west, so the sun goes down over open water with nothing in the way — no hills, no buildings, no far shore. Almost nowhere else east of the Rockies gets an unobstructed water sunset.
Then it is the air. Moisture coming off the lake and the dust and haze of a warm afternoon scatter the short blue wavelengths out of the low sun and leave the reds and oranges, which is why the colour deepens as the sun drops. Add some broken cloud to catch the light from underneath and you get the ones people photograph badly and remember perfectly.
Locals will tell you the best ones come after a front passes, when the air is clean and there is scattered cloud left over — and that the show is not finished when the sun goes down. Stay ten minutes longer. The afterglow, when the light comes back up off the water and the whole sky goes pink behind you, is usually better than the sunset itself.
Any of the beach access points along this stretch will do. Bring something warm.