Big Bay de Noc is a bay in the

Upper Peninsula The Upper Peninsula of Michigan – also known as Upper Michigan or colloquially the U.P. – is the northern and more elevated of the two major landmasses that make up the U.S. state of Michigan; it is separated from the Lower Peninsula by ...

of the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

. The bay, which opens into Lake Michigan's Green Bay, is enclosed by Delta County. The

Garden Peninsula The Garden Peninsula is a peninsula of in length that extends southwestward into Lake Michigan from the mainland of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The peninsula is bordered by Lake Michigan on the east, and by Big Bay de Noc on the west. The base ...

is on the east side of the bay and the Stonington Peninsula is on the west side. The small Delta County settlements of

Garden A garden is a planned space, usually outdoors, set aside for the cultivation, display, and enjoyment of plants and other forms of nature. The single feature identifying even the wildest wild garden is ''control''. The garden can incorporate bot ...

and

Nahma Nahma may refer to: Places: * Nahma Township, Michigan Nahma Township is a civil township of Delta County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 495 at the 2010 census, slightly down from 499 at the 2000 census. Nahma was establish ...

are harbors on the shore of the bay. As with the more thickly-settled

Little Bay de Noc Little Bay de Noc is a bay in the Upper Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. The bay opens into Lake Michigan's Green Bay. The bay, consisting of approximately 30,000 acres (120 km²), is enclosed by Delta County. The cities of Escan ...

, the bay's name comes from the

Noquet The Noquet were a group of Native Americans who lived on the Upper Peninsula in Michigan. They spoke an Algonquian language. They are thought to have been most closely related to the Menominee Indians The Menominee (; mez, omǣqnomenēwak ...

(or ''Noc'') Native American people (thought to have been related to the

Menominee The Menominee (; mez, omǣqnomenēwak meaning ''"Menominee People"'', also spelled Menomini, derived from the Ojibwe language word for "Wild Rice People"; known as ''Mamaceqtaw'', "the people", in the Menominee language) are a federally recog ...

of the Algonquian language group), who once lived along the shores. The bay is historically important for its 19th-century use as a center of the Lake Michigan

iron smelting Smelting is a process of applying heat to ore, to extract a base metal. It is a form of extractive metallurgy. It is used to extract many metals from their ores, including silver, iron, copper, and other base metals. Smelting uses heat and a c ...

industry. A former smelting complex has been preserved as

Fayette State Park Fayette Historic State Park is the state park of the historic town of Fayette in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is located on the Big Bay de Noc of Lake Michigan, between Snail Shell Harbor and Sand Bay, on the southern side of the Upper Peninsu ...

. The state park's ''Snail Shell Harbor'', off Big Bay de Noc, offers a harbor of refuge for small boats and yachts. A lighthouse, the

Peninsula Point Light The Peninsula Point Light is a lighthouse located at the southern tip of the Stonington Peninsula in Bay de Noc township in Delta County, Michigan. United States Coast Guard historical documents have over the years listed the name of the site ...

, marks the entrance of the bay.

Climate

References

External links

Bays de Noc Convention and Visitors Bureau
{{Authority control Bodies of water of Delta County, Michigan Bays of Michigan Bays of Lake Michigan