Lakeside ‘cottage’ always seems to draw a crowd

The tiny cottage Charlie and Linda Ash bought on the western shore of Houghton Lake was once part of a summer resort – one of several cabins in a tidy row; the last before reaching the lake. The neighboring lakeside lot they later purchased had served the resort’s vacationing renters who swarmed its beach in summer’s pursuits – swimming, fishing and boating in the warm water of the state’s largest inland lake.

That was 1970, the year the two were married.

Now grown to three generations, the Ash family recently tore down its beachside bungalow – the last of the original cabins – building in its place a party palace nearly 10 times larger than the cottage it replaced.

Other than that, life at the former resort hasn’t really changed all that much.

“It’s nothing to find people all over the lawn on a holiday weekend,” said Linda Ash, who still refers to the spacious vacation retreat as “the cottage.”

And everybody’s welcome. Lakeside living is about people and lifestyle as much as it is the view from all those windows. The Ashes have it all.

“You couldn’t ask for a better relationship with neighbors,” Linda Ash added. “It seems like everybody ends up down here.”

Located on a narrow jut of land bordered on two sides by canals and a third by the lake, the vacation getaway is a veritable lakeside community center – a place where neighbors gather to enjoy each other’s company and the exceptional view.

“All the neighbors have been coming up here as long as we have,” said Charlie Ash, an attorney from Plymouth whose family spends nearly every summer weekend on the lakeshore.

Among those neighbors are Barb Cook and Phyllis Simon, both of Lansing. Weekend tenants of the old resort, they purchased a cottage when the resort’s owner retired.

“My daughter was the baby of the group when we started coming up here and she is going to be 40 (this year),” said Cook. “The kids grew up here.”

“We could tell you some stories about what it has been like,” Simon added. “We raised everyone together.”

Simon said vacation planning for the youngsters includes compiling lists – drawing up rosters to see who else will be Up North. It can be a long list.

The Ashes have twin daughters, Cari and Amy, 30, and a son, Paul, 22. There are also Charlie’s fishing buddies – five granddaughters ranging in age from 3 to 11.

And while Cook and Simon have six grown children each, their most recent generation counts 18 members combined.

When the weather is nice, most are likely to be found here – on the Ashes’ front lawn – entertained by a youth talent show, taking part in the perpetual volleyball game or enjoying grilled delights.

“Just find a table with some food and take a seat,” Linda Ash said, explaining the lakeside tradition.

Of course it could rain – forcing the entourage to duck for cover. Inside or out, there is not much difference in the view of the lake.

“The best part about it is you can see the lake from any place in the cottage,” said Ash. “And it is beautiful in the morning and late in the afternoon. There isn’t any place in the cottage (where) you can’t have a great view.”

With windows taller than six feet and transom windows above those, the 10-foot walls of glass on the main floor provide a wide-open vista of the lake.

“That is what is nice about having water on three sides. We wanted to keep it as open as possible,” said Charlie Ash. “The high ceiling accomplished that while saving space for upstairs.”

A separate sunroom, a radial bay surrounded by glass, allows for solitude while preserving the panorama. Next to that is Linda Ash’s favorite room – a reading nook, complete with a gas-log fireplace and its own wet bar – the perfect exile for those cool post-Labor Day afternoons and evenings.

“When it is cold and icy outside, you can crank that fireplace up,” Linda Ash said. “We have good napping couches everywhere.”

With cherry woodwork adding richness and colonial columns and trim lending formal style, casual furnishings blend well with the lakeside setting. And while final decor is a work in progress, the Ashes know where they are headed with that.

“We plan to decorate in an outdoor theme,” said Charlie Ash, pointing to an appropriate picture of ducks landing on open water. “We don’t want it too rustic, but we like the outdoor, the Up North theme.”

An attorney with the Southfield law firm Sommers Schwartz, Charlie Ash said he will probably never completely retire. That is the thought behind another unique room – with glass on three sides, the only solid wall in his office contains a floor-to-ceiling bookcase. The room is certainly inviting – if not to work, then to take in the view.

And while lake-view preservation was what they sought, a tour of the kitchen provides other clues to the home’s design.

“For 35 years, the whole cottage was about the size our kitchen is now, and we used to put our whole family in it,” said Linda Ash.

With four bedrooms and six beds, Charlie Ash called the current accommodations limitless.

“We put in extra-thick carpet pads, so that should not be a problem,” he said, adding that before, invited guests couldn’t sleep in the house. “We used to have tents all over the yard.”

Not any longer.

At nearly 6,000 square feet, the cottage will likely handle all the guests the Ashes invite. And comparing the structure’s nearly $700,000 price tag with the original purchase price of two lots and a cottage for under $20,000 total, Charlie Ash can appreciate how lakeside property values have grown.

That the house is everything they envisioned is no surprise, according to Linda Ash, recalling that original drawings of the home were details and designs her husband sketched on napkins and scrap paper.

“Eventually we ended up at the architects’ and they pulled it all together. It helped that Bob had the same vision we did,” said Charlie Ash, speaking of builder Bob Brotebeck of Houghton Lake.

“It is not your typical Up North home,” said Brotebeck. “We could not have gotten a larger house on the lot. It is almost like a fish bowl. It’s all glass and it’s wide open to the whole lake. They have a very unique area back there.
“And they all get along so well. That is what is so unique about it.”

Don’t tell that to Charlie and Linda Ash and their neighbors. They really don’t know any different.

“It is the way it’s always been,” said Charlie. “We’re like one big family on the weekends around here.”