GREAT EXPECTATIONS
As big as an ocean, or so it seems from its shores, Lake Michigan is the fifth largest lake in the world. With breaking waves on windy days and icebergs in winter storms, the lake changes the climate for hundreds of miles, and hosts dozens of ecosystems.
Four states touch its shores: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin. Its banks claim to be the former chopping grounds of the American folk hero Paul Bunyan, a lumberjack whose likeness graces highway signs, statues and kitschy postcards from the area. The lake’s shores are also home to some pioneer craft distillers: people who founded the first legal distillery since Prohibition in – name the place.
Two major cities, Chicago and Milwaukee (neither in Michigan), sit on Lake Michigan’s shores. The greater Chicago area, cupping the southwest corner of the lake, is home to about two dozen gin makers, from North Shore Distillery in Lake Bluff to
