The EJ1096 Family Michigan Trip

[ej1096]

From Christmas we went to Munising and made our way up along Pictured Rocks. All I can say is WOW! That area is amazing. Every place we went was just unreal. If we ever move to Michigan the Pictured Rocks area is where I want to live. If it has to be in a van down by the river... so be it. We started out going to Munising Falls. It's an easy hike (800 ft. from the parking lot) The path is paved and flat. Even though you get that "touristy" feel, I think it was worth it. Waterfalls are cool and the walk is nice.

The path follows the stream from the water fall and over a bridge.


After the falls we drove up along Washington st. We found access to a beach and spent a long time just bumming around. Theres no way to describe what it was like so I'll just show pics. The pics don't do the area justice tho.


After playing around at the beach we drove up to Miners Castle. Miners Castle is pretty cool. We learned you can't go to Miners Castle for the first time and NOT get "that" photo. Its funny, I googled Miners Castle while looking for places to go. I saw hundreds of " That Photo". I told myself, "Self, you can take a family photo because thats a memory. But you don't need to take another one one of "That Photo". All of you who have been there are reading and laughing because you know what photo I'm taking about. you took one too if you had a camera. And if you didn't, the person you were with did. Now, with all that said, there is a reason for "that photo". Because "that view" is just awesome. So, like a moth to a flame, snap went the shutter.













The water is so clear, from the look out deck you could see bigger fish swimming if you watched closely enough.


It was starting to get to that point in the day where we should be thinking about camp and dinner. We wanted to find a site and get camp set up with enough time to relax and watch the sun set over the lake. We decided to skip the Log Slide today and check it out first thing in the morning.

We made our way up to Twelve Mile Beach campground. I loved that place. The drive was fun, scenic and we found a site lake side overlooking the beach. The site had a sand tent pad, fire pit and table. The sites were far apart and private. The best part was it was not busy so there were only a few people there.

The drive out there.


We moved in to our new home for the night and set up shop.


After moving in, we headed down to the beach. The camp site sat above the beach on a sandy bank. The trek down took no time at all. The trek up, took a bit longer. We walked the beach, took some photos, tried to find cool rocks, found some cool bugs instead, and watched one of the most spectacular sunsets I have seen since living in Florida.

"Gerald", the green whatever it is


No explanation required.


We made our way back to camp for Food, Fire and bed.

To Be Continued...

 

[ej1096]

Day 6

Day 6.

After the usual routine, We left camp and headed out. You cant be in the area and NOT stop in at ROAM. So, we headed down to Wetmore. I wanted a hat and the Mrs. wanted to see Forward Frank (ok, I did too). We showed up and interrupted TJtoytech from his job and awkwardly did that whole "Hi, you don't know me but...." Thing. To Tj, if you read this. Thank you for the hospitality and taking the time out of your day to talk with a couple strangers. My wife still talks about getting to see Forward Frank. So the Mrs. got to see Forward Frank, I bought a nice hat and Tj threw in a few stickers (I think a ROAM sticker adds like 5hp, car seems to be faster).

Some ROAM shots.


100% agree!


We said our good byes to Forward Frank and a sincere thank you to TJ then,headed out. We back tracked a bit so we could see the Log Slide. If I had not known where it was I would have thought from pictures that it was in the Bahamas some where. It was fun to see the transition of the shoreline from the west in Duluth to the east. The areas are so very different.

Amazing, simply amazing.


This is one of the old horse carts they used to move the logs around.


From the Log Slide, the next goal was Crisp Point Light House. We went to Grand Marais and then jumped on 407/58. That was a fantastic drive. It seemed like there was a million side tracks to take and explore. The wife had a tough job keeping me focused. Every time we passed a side track my first response was "whats down there?lets go find out". Or " OHHHH, look at THAT path! Lets go!".



We drove through an area that had been hit by a forest fire. It was cool but very surreal and creepy at the same time. This pic was from an area that was recovering well. Some of the areas just looked like giant tooth picks sticking out of the sand.




We eventually made it to the light house. The attendants were awesome people. Very friendly and really knowledgeable about not just the light house but the whole area in general.

Our WRX found "Dad" the Out Back sitting in the parking lot.




We hung around the area for a bit, took it all in, talked to the attendants and made another contribution to the local economy. Then we were off, Next stop, Tahquamenon Falls. After many more miles of me smiling because we were no where near pavement, we found pavement and eventually the Falls. Because it was getting late we only went to the lower falls.


We didn't spend as much time there as we would have liked. But oh well, another reason to return. We had an ultimate goal for the night.


We pulled in to town and decided it would be nice to eat without being bombarded by mosquitos. We also wanted some internet so we could look up some things we wanted to check out. We found Applebee's and spent a ridiculous amount of time there. Then it was time to find a place to crash for the night.

 

[ej1096]

Day 7

YES, I'm going to finnish this trip report if it takes all year. And they way things are going it just might. "Down time" is in short supply it seems. Sorry all.

The end of day 6 left us at an Applebee's in Sault St. Marie. We hung out there for a long time. When it was time to leave we checked around and found a campground to crash at. I'll be honest, I have no idea what campground it was. I just remember feeling "under dressed" for being there. We pulled our loaded down dirty subie in among the pristine mobile Mc Mansion's and Semi traileresque pull behinds. We were like the white trash of the neighborhood.... And it was AWESOME!. You could just see peoples envy shrouded in smugness. Their faces said "I'm better than you" but their eyes said " I wish I could go where you go." When we got to our site, it was late enough that we didn't bother setting up the tent. We cleared out the backseat for the little one and the Mrs. and I just reclined the seats. We were there to sleep and that was all. Incidentally we have no pictures, even if we did take some. Any local KOA looks about the same.

DAY 7

We woke up, put the backseat back into order and positioned our seat backs in the upright and locked position, we were ready to take off. We left the Beverly Hills RV park and went exploring Sault St. Marie.


We heard there was another lake freighter that had been turned into a museum. You can tour the ship and museum so we figured because we could not get in the one in Wisconsin, we would try this one.


Strike 2, In all fairness we were a few hours early.


Well, we had other stuff to do today so we continued on. We left the Valley Camp and headed over to the Soo Locks. When we arrived, we found there was a ship going through. Looks like we timed something right HA! We stuck around and watched the ship. It's kinda like watching paint dry but in a "whoa this is cool, I've never seen paint before" kinda way. Watching the ship leave really puts into perspective how big they are.


A little perspective.


After checking out the locks and going through their mini museum, we left Sault Ste. Marie. Our Eastward trek was done. The new direction of the day was South. We had a date to keep so we had to leave the wonderful world of gravel, dirt and no traffic. We jumped on I-75 and Southbound we went. We went down to St. Ignace and across Big Mac. We came across a park on the north side of the bridge it was a cool place with good views of the lake and bridge (hence the name).




We left the park and headed down to the "main land" we were leaving the Magical kingdom of the UP. But just for a few days.

The Mrs. kept looking up, I figured she was just taking in the sites, turns out she was just looking for the part Mike Rowe from Dirty Jobs painted.

We crossed the bridge and took a moment to drive around Macinaw City. We did not spend too much time because we would be back in a few days and it was at least 4 hours without stops to our next destination. We did grab some pics though.


They are either running from Godzilla or they can't handle the awsomeness of the Subie. I think its the Awesomeness thing as I did not see a giant lizard. .

We headed out of Macinaw City. The ultimate goal for the day was Ludington Mi. We didn't want to just stick to the interstate so we hugged the shore of Lake Michigan as much as possible . The route we took brought us through Petosky, Traverse City and Manistee. Here is some pics along the way.


Everybody needs a traveling mascot. This guy had Scooby Doo strapped to his bike. We had Odie

More gratuitous water pics.


"THE MAN". I thought we were going to get pulled over, I was trying to make up some time. We got a thumbs up instead.

Eventually we made it to Ludington Mi. This would be our home for the next 3 days. We stayed at the Best Western Lake Winds. The staff was awesome. I can't say enough good things about them.


That night we got some food, hung out with my parents and went swimming. Then it was off to bed, A real bed, a bed we didn't have to set up or tear down in the morning. NIce!