from Duluth, MN to Houghton, MI

Today was a looong one, due in part to a human error – map reading, communication and general unfamiliarity with the area – and for the other part due to massive flooding that had occurred just prior to our visit.

It was pretty, though, and yielded up some fun and interesting things that we might otherwise have never seen/done. So. Happy accident! (Except, I hope it's understood, for the flooding part.)

Sue and I had agreed, last night, that we were headed to the Keewenaw Peninsula of Michigan, which juts into Lake Superior. Not to be confused with the Bayfield Peninsula of Wisconsin, which also juts into Lake Superior. But when you’ve never visited either, you don’t necessarily notice the difference. And especially when you can’t see “the big picture:” there is no map in a Road Atlas, except for the giant picture of the entire United States, that clearly shows both peninsulas in relation to each other. Road Atlas publishers generally treat the Upper Peninsula of Michigan as almost an afterthought, so it can be super-difficult to navigate using such maps.

So instead of taking an hour-and-a-half to get from Duluth to Ashland, our mistake tacked on an extra hour, just in time behind the wheel alone. Not counting the stop for delicious Cornish pasties in a town whose name I’ve regrettably forgotten.

Not counting the “Local Traffic Only” sign that we saw and ignored as we tried to get up to the banks of Lake Superior, only to find, a few miles later, that the road was closed with extremely good reason: the aforementioned flooding had caused a massive drainage pipe to float up and buckle the roadway – resulting in a wide gap that even the Dukes of Hazzard wouldn’t have been stupid enough to try to jump.

Not counting the wild ride on unpaved roads, trying to get around the detour without going all the way back to the last town. (Lawsy! Here we go again!)

And of course, that far up in Michigan (or so I thought) my cell phone wouldn’t be working; I’d had prior experience with that on previous trips to the UP. I took the map, asked Sue to show me her best guess as to where we were, and just exactly where she’d been trying to navigate us to … and it was then that I realized she’d taken us onto that peninsula in Wisconsin.

As far up on the peninsula as we were at that point, it would have taken us almost as much time to backtrack as it would’ve taken to stay the course. Eventually (obviously) we found our way around the detour and arrived on the banks of Lake Superior to find

No kidding! No, the road hadn't led directly into the water; my best guess is that the debris you see to the right of the signs is what remains of the road bed after the flooding had buckled it. And notice the unusual color of the water! From my visit to Lake Superior a few years ago, I had distinct memories of its shimmering, shiny, silvery waters. Not … Pink.

We went further, to find a park on the banks of the Lake, and discovered that kayakers use this park to head out to the Apostle Islands Sea Caves.

  

In our “exploration” of this small park, I learned that kayaking out to these sea caves is 1. not for the faint of heart, 2. not for any except the absolute best kayakers and swimmers, and 3. absolutely not for foolhardy people who are heedless of weather. Lake Superior is unpredictable – cue Gordon Lightfoot, singing “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” – and even if you started out under the best of atmospheric conditions to find the conditions suddenly changed, even youth and athleticism won’t save you if you get into trouble around these caves. I won’t go into gory detail, but the word “treacherous” keeps popping into mind.

Still, it was a lovely little stop, with a couple of nifty hiking trails. And more pink water. I think it must be pink from silting during all the flooding.

The town of Bayfield is cute as can be, very touristy, reminding me a lot of Cape Cod destinations. And one of the local seafood markets offers excellent smoked fish spread and smoked salmon!

We finally made it to the once relatively populous port city of Ashland … and more pink water.

Our next stop was Wakefield, Michigan, and what a lucky stop that was! We stopped because Sue had noticed a statue that was very reminiscent of a statue that stands in Punta Gorda, Florida, where we both had lived significant portions of our lives. Sue went inside to the adjacent Visitor Center, to learn the story of Peter Toth, a Hungarian immigrant and sculptor who became fascinated with Native American culture. Toth made it his mission to place at least one of his statues (as a gift) in each of the 50 states, thus creating the “Trail of the Whispering Giants.” He completed his mission in Hawaii in 1988; additionally there are statues in Ontario, Manitoba and his native Hungary. As of this writing, Toth is very much alive, aged 70.

As wonderful as it was to learn of Toth, the stop turned out to be lucky because the gentleman in the Visitor Center explained what was going on with the massive flooding, and saved us a LOT of time by showing us which routes to take to avoid road closures. So the route we’ve taken to Houghton was probably not the most interesting, but it’s gotten us here!

We’ve done a little exploration of Houghton and neighboring Hancock, to discover even more horrifying damage done by the flooding. But we are safely tucked away in a Holiday Inn Express, ready for a good night’s sleep, with the promise of Cinnamon Rolls for breakfast followed by finding the beginning of Highway 41, tomorrow.

More photos from the Forces of Nature Tour at Flickr.

Click here.