The Long Way Home

August 18, 2009

We left Hancock, Michigan, early this morning, heading for home. After a few stops (which were mentioned in Wednesday’s blog), we arrived a little past noon at the Porcupine Mountains State Park.

We hiked up the lookout tower at Summit Peak, but it was too overcast for much of a view. After lunch in the car, we drove to Presque Isle on the west side of the Park.

Ever since I was able to pick up a trail map at Summit Peak, I had been studying it, trying to determine if we could really do both sides of the river around the falls at Presque Isle. I pretty much memorized the small map with its several trails; good thing, too, because a couple different people we met on the trail had questions about it.

After a quick potty stop, we headed off along the trail. We crossed the swinging bridge and started off heading north on the East River Trail, which is reported to be 1.2 miles. I don’t quite know how they figure mileage on a trail like this. Are they accounting for the vertical climbs over stairways of irregular, but all natural roots? And then there is the mountain goat in me who, with camera in hand, can’t stay on the trail anyway, but has to hang over every cliff and clamber down every slope that might end with a photo-op.

The views on the east side, though more challenging to get to, were better than on the west. You were able to get right down to the river and because it was challenging, there were fewer people. At the end of the East Trail, you cross the Presque Isle River on the South Boundary Road and dive back into the woods on the West River Trail.

This trail had its trials also, namely one outrageous hill that I cannot believe they would expect anybody else to climb, except for crazies like me. And poor Himey who was just along for the ride.

I don’t know if I can adequately describe the falls – well, I know I can’t. But I wish there was a distinguishing feature about each that I could document to make picture-labeling easier. From south to north, they are named Nawadaha Falls, Manido Falls, Manabezho Falls and the one closest to the opening to Lake Superior is Unnamed Falls, according to the Gazetteer. And it isn’t even marked on the State Park map. It drops probably ten feet and is really interesting so I think it should have a name. Maybe I should write to the Michigan Parks Department about it, they could have a contest to pick the name.

It was all very spectacular. I really should come here more. We drive to Black River Harbor and its waterfalls at least every couple years. The Porkies is only like – I have no idea how much further up the road. As the crows flies, only ten miles. In a car, on a road, much further, but still not a crazy distance.

Oh, yes, and I took some 325 pictures on this entire three day trip to the UP. It makes it too easy to go nuts when you have a digital camera!

More random exploring

August 18, 2009, Tuesday

We checked out of the Ramada Inn in Hancock, Michigan, at 8:15 this morning. While driving around earlier we had passed signs for Lake Shore Drive, so thought we would check it out this morning. The weather today is quite a change from yesterday. Monday the weather was so warm and sunny; today is overcast to the point of nearly drizzling. And cold too.

Along Lake Shore Drive, there is a charming little park, with an attached campground. On the park grounds there is this fantastic play area called chutes and ladders. Just like the old board game, you can climb up different ladders or stairways of various lengths, and then slide down a slide - a chute - of assorted sizes. It was awesome, too wet and damp to explore now, but some day we will have to come back, with a kid in tow to trial it.

I found yet another waterfall that I wanted to explore. Wyandotte Waterfalls is just adorable, but with the dry summer we have had, it was not really a waterfall at all, not even a trickle, more like a drip-drop. It is in a very cool setting though, all damp and mossy and full of rocks and fallen trees. It reminded me of something from the “Lord of the Rings”.

We took a chance on returning to Old Victoria, and there was no one else there except the volunteers. What a relief. The one gal we talked to said they offer a tour for five dollars a person, to hear all about who lived in what house and what their lifestyle was like. After having gone to a hundred, ok at least seven, other old restored villages and hearing the dialogue on them all, I didn’t need to hear it again. I just wanted to take pictures.

So we wandered around and I took lots of pictures. We still left a $5 donation in the box by the gate. The gal in the office had told us about some places to stop up the road, so we did that. We climbed to the top of the old tailings piles and had quite a view all the way to Lake Superior. We also found lots more rocks to take home.

I do feel guilty picking up rocks everywhere I go. Is it like stealing? And will these places ever run out of rocks? And the big question, what in the world makes rocks so fascinating? Himey, bless his heart, picked up this honking huge one just for me. He never fails to amaze me.

Chutes and Ladders play area in Houghton's RV Park.

Wyandotte Waterfalls

Old building at Old Victoria

Road to Happiness (I just heard that on a commercial. I am tired)

August 17, 2009, Monday

After we left the Jampot, in Michigan’s far northern UP, we stopped at the Eagle Harbor Lighthouse long enough for a picture. Then I wandered around Silver River Falls, scrambling down the narrow path along the river to get pictures of all the possible views of the series of falls.

Back in the car, we drove around the next bend in the road and we were there. The place that is heaven on my earth. I don’t know why, I don’t know what it is about that little roadside park, Esery Roadside Park to be exact, but I am in love with it. My memories of all the times I was there coming flooding back and I am a little kid again. Pat is there and the world is beautiful, there is no pain, no cancer and certainly no death. The rocks to crawl on, the endless sound of waves hitting the rocks, the views in every direction, every angle.

We ate tuna lunch packs, veggies, chips, an orange, and pineapple juice for lunch. I sat in the sun while Himey picked up. I could have stayed forever, but we had miles to go before we slept and I had more to show Himey.

By mid-afternoon, we were finally through Copper Harbor and to Fort Wilkins. We wandered around the old fort and Himey seemed to like it. He likes all that historic stuff. Well, I do too, but over the years I have probably overdosed on historic places in the United States. I still want to really do Washington, DC, and Williamsburg. But how long would that trip take, if I can’t do Keweenaw Peninsula in two days?

Where else did we stop that afternoon? The Copper Harbor cemetery which is an insanely rundown place, even though some gravesites are only a couple years old. Haven Falls which is right in the village of Lac La Belle. It is just a narrow little trickle of a falls, even in a wet year, and there is a cute rustic walking bridge, though Haven Creek is small enough to jump over.

As we continued down the road, I learned of one more waterfall that I wanted to see, just outside of Hubbell. The “Guide to 199 Michigan Waterfalls” gave directions that would have a person believe that the Hungarian Waterfalls is just out of town, a few hundred feet off the road. Even the Gazetteer makes it looks easy to find.

We found the Hungarian River, but it is in such a deep gorge and there was so much foliage that you could barely discern a river below. While I was exploring the road on the other side of the River, Himey ran into some people, natives of the area, who assured us we were on the right track. After ascending several cliffs to get up river, I had to succumb. The Hungarian River Falls were not willing to expose themselves that day.

Esery Roadside Park

Fort Wilkins

Haven Falls

Water, waterfalls, and a jar of jam

August 17, 2009

From our hotel under the lift bridge in Hancock, Michigan, we took Hwy 41 to 203, which snakes along Portage Lake to McLain State Park.

We spent a lot of time wandering the beach, walking around the many picnic areas and recreation areas, drove through the campground. I think I convinced Himey that we need to try camping here next year. They have running water, electricity and hot showers, for Pete’s sake. It’s just like being at home only with fantastic views of Lake Superior. They even have mini-cabins for rent if the camping thing is too traumatic.

After McLain our next stop was the Calumet Township Park. Again, it was right on Lake Superior, had a beautiful beach, some sand and some rocks to pick. I almost lost my sandals in the water when I had to go wading in to rinse off some rocks. Himey was waiting for me to fall in.

The weather is beautiful, a little warm inland in the sun, but on the Lake, there was a little breeze keeping it comfortable. Not a cloud in the sky.

After getting gas in Calumet, we next pulled over at Eagle River Falls. The falls is over an old abandoned dam and really pretty. This is one of the few places that I have a picture of from when I was a kid. That picture turned out really well, the water was higher than. The neat thing about the falls in Eagle River is that you can practically see it from your car; nice for people who can’t hike some rabbit path through the woods, but not a good thing for me, because I like to explore.

Jacobs Falls was twenty minutes later. Again, you can see it from your car, and I mean right from your car, because the falls is twenty feet from Hwy 26 and then the stream goes under the road. There really isn’t a good place to park right there, but just a hundred feet or so down the road there is a parking lot for Jampot, the gift shop of the monks of the Society of St. John. I don’t remember it being here before, but their newsletter says that they have been there for 25 years. I will have to study my notes from previous trips and see if I mention it at all. We naturally had to buy goodies from the monks.

The Lake Superior shoreline at McLain State Park

Eagle River Falls in lovely downtown Eagle River, Michigan

Jacob Falls, just down the road from the Jampot

What else perks me up?

August 16, 2009, Sunday

If you read Monday’s blog, you remember I was a bit disappointed at the ghost town of Old Victoria, in Michigan’s UP. We didn’t stay long, but our next stop made up for it. The Rockland cemetery. Nothing perks me up quite like an old cemetery and the chance to grill Himey on his profession. I love it when he talks shop, telling me that he won’t allow this or that in his cemetery or that he would mow this or that over. Lots of old monuments.

We probably got back to Rockland at 1:00 and ate lunch in the car in the parking lot of the Rockland Museum. Had leftover chicken and fries from dinner last night, raw carrots and cauliflower, and potato chips. After we got done eating, we naturally had to go inside, mostly so I could wash my hands. So we had to look at the museum too, which was actually pretty nice, lots of little exhibits, impressive though for such a small town.

As we hit the road, I started pawing through the maps trying to plan my next move and decide if we would try to come back to Old Victoria on the way home, and how we could get there without totally retracing out steps. So we went all the way east to Keweenaw Bay instead of cutting straight up to Houghton. I don’t think I had ever been on that road, Hwy 38 to Baraga, so that was nice, except that the weather was still dreary and rainy off and on. Last we drove up along the water to the Ramada Inn, sitting on the canal next to the lift bridge.

When you don't get the blizzard you want

August 16, 2009, Sunday

The weather was not looking promising as we left home for vacation a little after eight this morning. I couldn't decide where to stop first or even which route to take to our destination Hancock in Michigan’s UP.

I finally made up my mind to go to Agate Falls. It is just off of Hwy 45, on Hwy 28, south of Bruce Crossing. You get to it on a trail from the Joseph E. Oravec roadside park. It is a cute little park, along the middle branch of the Ontonagon River.

From the park, you walk on a paved path, and then a boardwalk for maybe a quarter mile, under the highway and under an old railroad trestle to get there. The trestle is the coolest part. You can’t really get close to the falls; just view it from the observation platform at the end of the trail. But then we crawled up a rabbit path to the trestle, which is now a snowmobile trail. What a view from up there, would probably be even cooler though, if I wasn’t so terrified of heights.

A little ways up the road, Hwy 45 goes through the little village of Rockland. From there we took the Victoria Dam Road four miles to Old Victoria, a mining town from the 1800’s that is being restored. I have always wanted to go there, and didn’t think anything of it when there was a sign on the turn-off that said “Craft Fair Old Victoria today”. We easily found the little spot in the road known as Victoria. There were about four log cabins, a couple sheds, a few ruins, along with 12 or so venders with their canopy tents selling their homemade goods.

I would have been ok with it, because they had some cool homemade crafts and things, but you know how it is when you have your heart set on a cookie dough blizzard and you get a Reese’s pieces blizzard instead? It is just kind of made me sad.

Keweenaw County, Michigan, 2009

This time we are going to one of my favorite places in the world, and having been to Kenya and Peru and a lot of the United States, it seems hard to believe that I only have to drive three hours to get there, but it is true. I have been to Houghton/Hancock and the Keweenaw Peninsula of Michigan’s UP many, many times, with both Mom and Dad as well as with Pat. There is this one wayside that is just engrained in my brain. Something about it just – it is magical. And there is Fort Wilkins and McLain State Park and some waterfalls and just plain Lake Superior alone would do it for me.

I cannot believe that in 12 years I have not brought Himey up here. Life just goes by too fast and we think we have to spend our downtime going somewhere new and far away. But like I said already, why not just drive 200 miles and be in a place where you know you will be happy, content, at peace with your soul. Sorry to be sappy but it is true. This is where my soul lies.

Ha, ha, with the purchase of my old new used laptop, in 2009, I wrote the remaining travel journal entries as they happened. Which means the next few weeks, until I am all up to speed in 2011, my blog entries are pretty much already written. And before you know it, I will be off to better and bigger things in this blog. Please stay tuned for lots of change.