Oregon Trail: The UP

As the name of this blog might imply, we tried to let serendipity guide us in our travels, balanced with our need to arrive in Oregon on or about the 25th. It's often amazing to me the tips you can get from locals about things that you can see that rarely appear on the radar, that are so worth the small detour and the time to see them. A case in point: Saturday morning while walking the dogs in Cuyahoga NP in Ohio, we met a couple of women who were doing a bird census in the park. Ann started chatting them up: she would spend her entire day talking and never arrive at her destination if I weren't cracking the whip, or so it would appear from this side of the keyboard. ;) These local tips would really serve us incredibly well in South Dakota, but that's a few days down the road.

In any case, on hearing that we were considering a trip through the UP, the younger of the two women suggested that we had to see Pictured Rocks and to hire a boat to go see the rocks if possible. This would be something for us to consider for Sunday or Monday, and it being Saturday, we filed it away in the back of our minds as something to look at when we got settled in for the night and were sketching our route for the next day. At the hotel in Cadillac, we started looking at Pictured Rocks and found that not only was it another National Lakeshore, the photographs were stunning.

And so we found ourselves on Sunday morning heading north to the Mackinac Bridge, the UP, and Pictured Rocks. Timing was such that we could spend the afternoon in the park and head into the nearby town of Marquette MI, home to Northern Michigan University, for a late afternoon beer.

From Cadillac, right on the eastern edge of the Huron-Manistee National Forest, we headed east to the center of the state to pick up I-75 north to the bridge. On leaving the National Forest, we immediately found ourselves in serious farm country and I would say that dairy farming is the prime mover in these parts. We passed cluster after cluster of silos and milking barns for dozens and dozens of miles, the landscape dotted here and there with huge turbines of wind farms.

Farmland, Dairy and Wind

As we were navigating through the north-south and east-west farm roads to get to a major highway, Ann spied a long-legged bird cruising just to our right, a Great Blue Heron, certainly not an uncommon sight almost anywhere except the deserts and the Rockies. Another minute later, she spied another one just to our left. I had to duck down in my seat to see it and it was immediately clear that it was a Sandhill Crane, of which I have only ever seen one in my life, in a pond near Ocean City MD, probably blown way off course by a storm.

Just moments later, we passed a newly harvested field dotted with perhaps a hundred cranes, grubbing along the ground for whatever it is that they eat, no doubt gleaning the leftovers from the recent harvest. We were still not quite used to not being at home and finding ourselves in an alien context and cranes certainly added to that sense that we were no longer at home. Throughout the remainder of the trip, we would exclaim, "We're not in Virginia any longer!" several times a day.

We also passed a small herd of buffalo in a feed lot. We certainly were expecting to see bison on our trip, but not in Michigan. Other things along the way that let us know that we were no longer at home: finding so much polka on the radio, motorcyclists without helmets, golden brown carpets of ferns sprouting contrasting brilliant white trunks of paper birches.

Cruising up I-75 at 80 miles an hour, we were getting passed left and right by vehicles; it seems clear to us that speed limits in Michigan are more like guidelines and not absolute limits. Nobody seems to have any regard for speed limits there and the cops don't seem to care. At one point I remarked to Ann, "Can you imagine going more than about 20 minutes on any eastern interstate and not see a cop making a traffic stop?"

And so in short order, we came to the Mackinac Bridge, a long suspension bridge called variously Big Mac or Mighty Mac, that joins the lower part of Michigan with the Upper Peninsula where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron come together. We drew a toll both with a pony-tailed, über-friendly Native American tolltaker, who wished us with a broad smile, "Have fun in the UP eh you betcha!"

Mackinac Bridge

At this point, the slightly overcast day had given way to low clouds and a constant mist interspersed with small patches of rain. Across the bridge on the UP, we exited immediately onto US 2 which follows the northern shore of Lake Michigan and except for the northern species of conifers lining the north side of the road, our drive reminded us of driving along beaches in a lot of places. Lake Michigan as an abstract concept is a freshwater lake; in actuality, it resembles an inland sea with dunes, sandy beaches, waves, seagulls, and shorebirds.

Waves on Lake Michigan, US 2

Driving a bit more than half the length of the northern shore of Lake Michigan, we turned north in the Hiawatha National Forest and set our sights on Munising MI on Lake Superior, home of the visitor center for Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, where we encountered an NPS ranger who clearly loves her job and her park and spent 15 minutes explaining to us the best places to visit in the 42-mile long park.

Sadly, we were really tired from days of driving and didn't want to be out on the road all afternoon, so we concentrated on areas near the visitors center. Our first stop was Miners Falls where we walked the dogs, then on to nearby stunningly beautiful Miners Castle. Working our way back west towards the visitors center, we stopped at the beach at Sand Point before viewing Munising Falls on the way in to Marquette for Happy Hour. Not that we had time, but because of the weather, all boat tours had been cancelled for the day.

Dogs Got to Walk to Miners Falls

Miners Falls

Mini Bay at Miners Castle

Miners Castle

Waves on the Cliffs

Cliffs North of Miners Castle

Sandstone Formation, Miners Castle

White Campion, Silene latifolia, at Miners Castle

Oenothera at Miners Castle

Sand Point Beach

Sand Point Grasses

Semipalmated Plover, Charadrius semipalmatus

Munising Falls

Munising Falls Outflow

Fall Color, Munising Falls Creek

When we finished at Pictured Rocks, we drove a short distance into Marquette to Black Rocks Brewery, where we chatted with locals including a UNM student from Warrenton VA and enjoyed the sunshine outside the old house that houses the brewpub. While Ann checked out the swing, I sat back in an Adirondack chair made of old skis. After a couple of beers, we would head to our hotel and order a really crappy delivery pizza. The beers more than made up for the terrible pizza. Although we knew at the time that the beers at Black Rocks were excellent, we had no way of knowing that they would be the best of very many great beers that we would sample across the country.

Enjoying the Sun and a Beer

Embracing Her Inner Kid

We were very hesitant to leave the dogs in the car, but with the cool weather, we decided to try it for a short while. They did very well and curled up on one another and slept while we were gone. I had some worries about Grace trying to eat the car while we were away, but they both did awesome.

Two Sleepy Dogs