Pure Michigan - The Upper Peninsula

After leaving Duluth and driving through Wisconsin on our tour of the upper great lakes, we arrived in the upper peninsula (UP) of Michigan. It's a beautiful and sparsely populated area. Although it makes up nearly 1/3 of Michigan's area, it contains only 3% of the state's population. In the 1800s the copper and lumber industries thrived in the UP, and a lot of Cornish and Scandinavian immigrants moved here to work. The area still shows this influence, with Cornish pasties (a type of savory pastry) everywhere, and signs for businesses with Scandinavian names. Water is everywhere - the UP is sandwiched between three great lakes, and has countless small lakes and streams. Our first stop was Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park, in the western tip of the UP. Because of the rugged terrain, this is the one part of Michigan that was never logged, so the forests are old growth northern hardwoods. We took in the scenery along Lake Superior and the Lake of the Clouds and took a short hike along the escarpment trail. It's a beautiful area and we'd love to return to explore more of the park.

Reflection of clouds on a small lake we drove by.

David standing by Lake Superior.

Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park.

Lake Superior just barely visible on the left, Lake of the Clouds on the right.

The Escarpment Trail in the Porcupine Mountains. It was a beautiful trail on a beautiful day.

The sunlight coming through the canopy.

An acorn sprouting in a fallen tree.

Lake of the Clouds.

After hiking, we had pasties for lunch at Syl's Café in Ontonagon.

US 45 starts in Ontonagon and goes all the way to the Gulf of Mexico.

We briefly stopped in Marquette as well. It's the largest city in the UP.

Marquette has a cute downtown and waterfront park.

We stopped for a quick beer at Ore Dock Brewery in Marquette.

Our lodging for the night was one of the most unique places we've ever stayed - an active lighthouse! Big Bay Point Lighthouse was built in 1896 and still has an active coast guard beacon at the top, although these days it's entirely automated. The bottom two floors are run as a bed and breakfast. We had a great stay and it was neat to see the remote coast of Lake Superior on Big Bay.



See, it's historic!

The inside has been restored and re-purposed as a B&B.

The view from the top of the lighthouse.

We weren't sure if lighthouses here are even necessary thanks to GPS, but here it is...with a little LCD light.

Paul's a lighthouse keeper!

Some kayakers paddling past the lighthouse trail.

David practiced skipping stones again.

Another fantastic Michigan sunset.

And another great local beer! We picked this one up in Duluth.

The lighthouse at sunset.

It was also wildflower season. Our whole trip was colorful.

One last view of sunset over Big Bay.

For our final day in the UP, we made a quick stop for a hike to the off-the-beaten path Big Pup Falls, then continued on to Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

Driving down a dirt road to get to the falls.

Big Pup falls. It was in the middle of nowhere. We hoped to see some otters, but didn't find any.

We made a quick stop for shopping in Marquette. The bike rack is a bike!

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore runs for 42 miles along Lake Superior in the middle of the upper peninsula. 200 foot tall sandstone cliffs rise out of the lake with a series of caves, arches, and coves. It's really a breathtaking place, and the best place to see it is from the water - so we booked a sunset kayak tour. We had a great view of the rocks and were able to kayak in to several small lake caves and through arches.

As an added bonus the lake water wasn't freezing cold this year! Since the lake didn't freeze over last winter (in fact it was so warm there was almost no ice on the great lakes at all) the water temperature was nearly 70°F. Even if the water were cold, it would still be a lot of fun, and we highly recommend you kayak if you visit Pictured Rocks.

The cliffs are impressive.

The rocks are stained with minerals as groundwater evaporates on the surface.

Whew, glad we weren't around when this big chunk fell off the cliff.

The cliffs tower over the other kayakers.

Some of the beaches on Lake Superior could almost pass for the Caribbean.

The stream at Mosquito Beach had a cool cascading effect over rock terraces.

Hiking up the stream at mosquito beach before continuing our kayak tour.

This little cove near mosquito beach was gorgeous.

Selfie time!

Greece? Nope, Lake Superior!

The color of the water was incredible. Check out that transition to deep blue at the drop-off.

We got back in our kayaks and paddled right through Lover's Leap Arch.

One of the iconic images of Michigan.

Our guide took this picture of us.

There we are! I guess taking centered pictures wasn't on the guide exam. :)

The cliffs changed colors as sunset approached.

Sunset kayak selfie.

It was a beautiful and peaceful kayak trip back to the starting point.

After our kayak tour, we were starving and devoured a pizza in Munising before driving to our hotel in Escanaba, on the shores of Lake Michigan. Our final day was mostly spent driving, but we had some time to make a few stops along the way. We passed though Green Bay and drove across the width of Wisconsin back to Minneapolis for our flight out.

We briefly stopped at Bay Beach amusement park in Green Bay.

We also drove by Lambeau Field, home of the Packers.

Chippewa Falls was cute in a "rust belt" sort of way.

We drove past a picturesque field of sunflowers.

David in the sunflowers.

Our short trip from Minneapolis to the UP and back was jam packed and there were still a lot of things we didn't have time to do, like Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, the Keweenaw peninsula, and the Mackinac Bridge. Hopefully one day we'll return.