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 Presque Isle Peninsula is home to two historic lighthouses. The old lighthouse was built in 1840 and the new lighthouse was built in 1870. The new lighthouse is one of the tallest on the Great Lakes with a tower 113 feet high. Tours of the lighthouse are available and there is a museum in the old lighthouse.
Thompson Harbor is locate to the west. an undeveloped coast within the Mackinaw State Forest that includes coastal sand dunes. The natural area encompasses a portion of a complex of forested dunes and swales. The dunes formed as lake levels receded, beginning approximately 12,000 years ago, depositing a series of low sandy beach ridges, ranging from 0.5 to 3 meters high. Since then, the ridges have become forested and the wet swales that developed between them are now either forested or open wetlands. In Michigan, there are fewer than 50 remaining examples of forested wet swale communities of this quality.
 This area supports one of the largest known populations in the world of the federal and state-threatened dwarf lake iris, Michigan’s state wildflower. Thousands of iris shoots, and several other plant species of special concern grow in the area.
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