Michigan hopes Chinese get smitten by 'the mitten'

Michigan's freshwater lakes and forests draw visitors from around the world. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Michigan's dunes are made of dead bears.

According to Chippewa legend, fire or famine forced a mother and two cubs to swim eastward across Lake Michigan to seek refuge.

Her offspring drowned a few kilometers offshore, becoming the North and South Manitou Islands. The mom died of despair on the beach, becoming the Sleeping Bear Dune.

According to geology, the sandy prominences are sediment accretions abandoned after gigantic glaciers clawed out of the Earth's crust in a slow-motion mauling and then melted into scars－leaving behind the five Great Lakes that account for a fifth of the world's surface freshwater, plus 11,000 smaller lakes across the state's two peninsulas. Not to mention the massive mounds of sand.

The dunes crash into Lake Michigan so abruptly that in places you can swim downhill in loose sand until you reach the beach－where you can keep swimming in the water.

According to ABC program Good Morning America, the Dunes National Lakeshore is "the most beautiful place in America". AOL Travel named the surrounding Traverse City area－near the "pinky" of the mitten-shaped state, aka "America's high-five"－among the US' Top 10 beach towns.

Conde Nast Traveler lists Mackinac Island to the north among the world's 10 best islands. Lonely Planet lauds nearby Lake Michigan's Gold Coast and Grand Rapids to the south collectively as the crown jewel in the US' travel treasure trove, ranking it as the No 1 destination last year.

Yet international accolades haven't translated into Chinese tourists' awareness of the state as a desirable destination.

But Michigan is reaching out to welcome more Chinese to the "hand" on the US heartland since visa policies changed nearly a year ago.

Few Chinese tourists currently make it beyond the US' coastal megalopolises, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder told China Daily in Beijing last month.

The reciprocal 10-year multiple-entry visas China and the US announced visas during last November's APEC meeting in Beijing likely means more will wash over the "third coast", as Michigan is called.

Once they've had their day in Los Angeles and chewed through New York, they'll journey inland.

"After you make your first trip, see the real America," Snyder says.

Travel Michigan vice-president Dave Lorenz says: "Most Chinese have used their limited-time visas to visit more iconic (sites), such as western national parks and New York. Now that we have a 10-year visa agreement, we anticipate growing inbound travel to Michigan."

Snyder has visited China annually since taking office in 2011 and established the Travel Michigan China Office during last year's visit.

The state has recently engaged the country's travel agencies and launched a Chinese-language tourism website.

"China will want to explore the affordable, fresh-air, freshwater 'real America' we offer," Lorenz says.

Detroit is the Michigan destination Chinese are most familiar with, the tourism office says.

But the state's natural areas are what make Michigan magical.

Art consultant to the Communist Party of China's Central Committee's school's library, Hou Yazhou, plans to visit the Traverse area this month to not only visit friends but also to paint landscapes.

The 71-year-old Beijinger has depicted the Great Wall. Now he wants to depict the Great Lakes.

"I don't want to go to cities," he says. "I want to see the countryside to see the scenery and experience local life."

It'll be Hou's first trip to the US since he spent a year in Ohio in 1991.

He plans to visit the dunes and forests, and boat the lakes. He'll go fishing and camping for the first time, plus drive along stretches of the 5,150 kilometers of freshwater shoreline that's outlined by lighthouses like a connect-the-dots drawing.

The artist, who also works for China's Olympic art delegations, will also hike some of the 107 state and national parks to see not only the landscapes but also the wildlife. Bears, deer, wolves, flying squirrels, tree frogs and turkeys prowl the vast woodlands.

More than 4 million hectares of public land are open for hunting.

And fireflies create sparkling constellations beneath the Milky Way that splashes across the sky after sunset. Night views often offer meteor showers and aurora borealis.

Hou will also tour some of the 100 wineries that stud 6,000 hectares of vineyards that wrap undulating topography.

Other leisure pursuits that appeal to Chinese include skiing and golf. There are more than 800 public courses, and Golf Digest last year ranked Michigan as the US' fourth best golf state.

As more Chinese become aware of what Michigan offers, and enjoy visas that go further and take them farther, it seems likely more will hop across the big pond to land in the Great Lakes state.