Kitch-iti-kipi at Palms Book State Park Guide

Kitch-iti-kipi — “the Big Spring,” Michigan’s largest freshwater spring — is 200 feet across, 40 feet deep, and so clear it plays a trick on your eyes: from a self-operated observation raft you crank yourself across the surface, and the bottom looks close enough to touch when it’s actually four stories down. Over 10,000 gallons a minute boil up through the sand in slow-motion clouds, ancient logs lie preserved on the floor, and big trout hang suspended in water that stays a flat 45 degrees every day of the year, so it never freezes and never warms. Don’t be the one who races the raft across for a selfie and misses it — the whole point is to stand still, look straight down through 40 feet of nothing, and let it mess with your sense of scale.