Back from da UP
Posted by Erin | Filed under Uncategorized
Actually, we’ve been back for over a week now, however I haven’t had time to update until now.It was a good trip – a lot of driving, but I got to kick back and relax and that is what I really needed. For details on the trip, click the “Read more..” link below – I will be adding more details about the trip as I have time.
Day One – Wed Feb 8 – We left TC at about noon, drove up US31 to Mackinaw City and The Bridge. I wish I had taken some pictures of it because it looks even more awesome in the winter, but alas I did not.
Next we drove on US2 from St. Ignace to Blaney Park, then up Mi-77 to Seney – note to self, visit Seney National Wildlife Refuge on next trip.
Most of this part of the trip was boring, just snow and trees and sky. However, the closer we got to Lake Superior, the thicker the clouds got and by the time we passed the Wildlife Refuge entrance drive it was snowing pretty good – lake effect.
The next leg was along 28 to Munising – note to self, visit Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore on next trip. Munising seems like it would be a nice quiet little town to live in – at least in the winter. We continued to follow 28 along Lake Superior toward Marquette. Near Chocolay there is a sign for “Chocolay Downs Road” which had one of its supports broken by (I’m guessing) a passing plow. The sign was pointing *down*. Get it? “Chocolay Downs Road”! Dammit, I wish we would have taken a picture of that too, its more humorous visually.
Marquette – well, I can’t find any pictures of it in Google, but coming into Marquette from 28 the first thing you see are 3 huge smokestacks right along the lakeshore, 2 close together and one up the shore a way. I don’t know if these are power plants or related to the copper industry, but they are pretty impressive. The other notable structure is a ginormous brown/black pier (see this picture, its behind the boat, which itself is massive). Downtown Marquette is a little bit like downtown TC, historical buildings and little specialty shops – which I bet the Marquette locals utilize more than we our downtown here in TC. They do have a Target and a Walmart Supercenter and other “modern” shopping out on US41 toward Negaunee though. But even along the major roads and highways not nearly as busy as it is around here. We stopped at Applebee’s for dinner about 5pm, it was pretty busy but I bet 80%+ of the people in that restaurant were just like us, either passing though or staying at a nearby hotel.
After dinner we continued west on US41 toward L’Anse and Baraga – 2 quaint little towns that we didn’t see much of since by that time it was dark. The road was pretty rough too.There is another quiet little town at the southeast end of Portage Lake called Chassel and from there another 10 minutes or so to Houghton. When we got there, it looked all the MTU greek houses were out working on their snow&ice sculptures. We were tempted to stop and look then, but a) they weren’t finished, and b) we were dead tired. So we pressed on, across the lift bridge and up and over the hills of Hancock to get to Calumet.
