I mentioned wanting to make this trip a few weeks ago on another forum and thought I'd put it up here. Since it was mentioned elsewhere how nice I'd be to have a map of the trip I took I have a picture of the route down here, minus various detours I took in certain areas.
I recently came back from a ten-or-so day vacation up around the Great Lakes in northern Wisconsin, northeastern Minnesota and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. It’s a trip I had been wanting to do for several years now. Originally I was going to go to Tokyo this year, but you’ll never guess what happened!
I started by driving around Chicago from Indianapolis, where I noticed that the Illinois Tollway had closed all their booths and had electronic tolling in place only, my first sign that things have changed since I was last up here. I get the feeling that this will eventually become permanent. Luckily I had an IPASS that I hadn’t used in two years and was able to make good use of it, both heading up north and coming back. I took Interstate 41 from the Illinois-Wisconsin border all the way to Green Bay.
The eight-lane section of Interstates 41 and 94 is quite impressive; the last time I was there it was under construction in various parts. But I must concur with others in saying that it’s stupid calling it Interstate 41. To me I-41 should start on the south side of Milwaukee and follow the corridor up to Green Bay. It appears the entire 41 corridor has more or less been updated. The section through Green Bay was quite impressive considering the size of that city. I do wonder why the Interstate 41 designation couldn’t be extended to the point where US 41 and US 441 break up north of Green Bay. Interstate 39 ends at the junction between two non-interstate highways after all and it doesn’t hurt it too much.
Anyway, after a day of waiting out the rain and getting the rest of my trip set up I wanted to clinch some major corridors across Wisconsin en route to Duluth, Minnesota, primarily Highways 29 and 53 via Eau Claire. I was again impressed with the state of these expressways/freeways across the state. It was a continuous flow across Wisconsin from Green Bay to Eau Claire and then from Eau Claire up to Superior. Going down the hill and seeing Lake Superior and Duluth was wondering and the weather was quite amazing too. The Duluth area impressed me very much so, with the two long bridges over the harbor and Interstate 35 through the city.
Entering Duluth along Interstate 535
Interstate 35 through Duluth, a very impressive highway there.
The Duluth Aerial Lift Bridge
View of I-35/US 53 interchange from Enger Tower in Duluth
View of a ship passing through the Lift Bridge from Enger Tower in Duluth
I spent the rest of the day in Duluth and then took the next day to explore the North Shore, driving up Highway 61 all the way to Grand Marais. With the current state of the border with Canada it felt more like driving in the Florida Keys a little, knowing that I’d have to turn around and head back to Duluth. In some ways Grand Marais could have been Key West, even if there’s more on that highway. Overall the drive was nice and it felt a little similar to my trip to Hawaii last year. With the waterfall, rock cliffs, beaches and big bodies of water there’s quite a lot of the Great Lakes area that feels like Hawaii, just substitute the warmth for some cool and the palm trees for some pine trees.
One of a couple of tunnels along Highway 61
Highway 61 along the North Shore of Lake Superior
Various scenes from the North Shore. There were plenty of waterfalls and lighthouses on this trip.
After that I took US 2 east across Wisconsin and into Michigan where I’d spend the rest of my trip. I spent a day clinching the US 2 corridor across Michigan (and a small section of Wisconsin) and I found a respect for just how massive the Upper Peninsula was. The first part of US 2 was quite desolate and it wasn’t until Iron Mountain where traffic was at least a little higher. Still, there was nothing wrong with the entire highway and I can very much agree that it never needs to be a freeway or even a four-lane highway all the way. At the end of the day I had cleared Iron Mountain, Escanaba and Manistique and arrived at St. Ignace. I also made very good use of the 65 speed limit on a lot of the highways. Considering the traffic I was pushing 70 plenty of times the whole day, traffic flowed very nicely up there.
The next day I had gone onto Mackinac Island and clinched M-185 via bicycle. I noticed the island even had a few mileage signs. It was actually a fine day on the island and exploring it was fun. Having taken some pictures while riding a bike along M-185 I was wondering if AARoads could ever need a guide for that highway in their Michigan section. After all, shouldn’t you “know the road before you go?”
A state highway ladies and gentlemen
Road construction along said state highway. Something to do with the rising level of the lake and protecting the highway from that I believe.
More views along the state highway.
A Mackinac Island mileage sign. Unlike most of Michigan, it's not in Clearview. It's also not in FHWA font either.
A view of Interstate 75 in the late afternoon, notice how the interstate passes over a suspension bridge
After more rain moved through the first part of the next day I made it up to Whitefish Point and Tahquamenon Falls. These two destinations, plus Mackinac Island and Sault Ste Marie were all places I’ve been to before with my father, so I was touching up on these places again and getting some more pictures of. After that I more or less followed M-28 from Newberry to Marquette. It had become windy that day, I even saw a tree knock some power lines over in Newberry and at the intersection with M-28 and M-123 all the lights were out.
Whitefish Point on Lake Superior
Tahquamenon Falls.
The Seney Stretch along M-28
This wind meant that driving along M-28 across the Seney Stretch was interesting. The sun was trying to make it out as I drove west and the wind was blowing hard on the road. But I saw what the wind could do when I reached the Lake Superior coast west of Munising. The waves were just as impressive from what I had seen in Hawaii last year. It seemed most of the days I was up along Lake Superior the waves were pretty good.
As I got closer to Marquette I went through what I would guess to be a “lake-effect” shower, but pulling off the road next to Lake Superior once more it gave me an awesome sight. With the sun coming out of the west I was treated to one of the best rainbows I had ever seen. I barely saw any in Hawaii last year, a state kind of well-known for their rainbows. But this “Pure Michigan” rainbow was quite a sight.
Going west from there I got used to the US 41-M-28 pairing through Marquette, where I spent the next couple of days exploring the region, both around Marquette and the Pictured Rocks back in Munising. I noticed most of the major intersections along the busiest road through Marquette were roundabouts with only a couple of stoplights and a smattering of Michigan lefts. Still traffic was going through there quite nice. I wonder if the last two stoplights are bound to become roundabouts eventually. My understanding is that there is a bit of an unofficial bypass around Marquette to the south as it is using one of the county roads so I would think that an actual bypass may not be that necessary.
Roundabout intersection along US 41/M-28 in Marquette
View of US 41/M-28 with Marquette and Lake Superior in the background
Iron Ore ship being loaded up in Marquette.
View of Marquette Lighthouse in the evening
Now in the heart of Labor Day weekend I departed Marquette and was originally going to make it to just Houghton. But I started getting a bit homesick and keeping an eye on the weather I started cutting down my trip while still accomplishing everything. So I drove on US 41 from Marquette all the way to the very end of the highway, seeing the famous sign there at the end plus the one mentioning the distance to Miami, Florida. I then got on the famous Brockway Mountain Drive to see views of the Keweenaw Peninsula and it was quite amazing up there, and also very windy, like super windy up there. At the Eagle Harbor Lighthouse I could look out onto Lake Superior and see a very dark sky to the north, a storm had formed over Isle Royale National Park. I hightailed it back to Houghton before any rain got to me. I walked around Houghton a bit including the lift bridge and found it a very interesting town, almost as active as Marquette was
The Lift Bridge in Houghton
Driving across the Lift Bridge
US 41 in the Keweenaw Peninsula
Perhaps among the most famous mileage signs in the country
On top of the Brockway Mountain.
Mileage sign on top of Brockway Mountain
Lighthouse and storm off Eagle Harbor, Michigan
Finally on Labor Day as I was driving to my last destination in the U.P., the Porcupine Mountains, I decided to try to make it all the way home to Indianapolis that day. I drove along M-26 to M-38 to M-64 to reach the Porcupine Mountains. There were parts there that made me feel like I was back in the Appalachian Mountains, along with a Great Lake nearby. I made one more stop along Lake Superior and watched as the skies were clearing up and another strong wind was blowing across the lake. This was a cold front coming on through and the waves were big. The arrival of fall I imagine. I was a little jarring thinking about this when it was in the 90s the next two days back in Indy. Because I was more interested in clinching corridors I wanted to do US 51 across Wisconsin (at least to Portage, WI), so I drove back to Ironwood and started US 51 in Hurley.
Lake Superior Labor Day morning
Porcupine Mountains Michigan
I figured there would be some traffic as it was Labor Day, but I did not read the post someone had make on this forum back over Memorial Day weekend about the heavy traffic around Woodruff. It was bumper-to-bumper across good parts of US 51 in northern Wisconsin. The worst of it was south of that community where I was going very slow for over ten minutes in a backup caused due to the presence of a passing lane. This whole trip there had been plenty of passing lanes along the Michigan highways and they were good, but here the passing lane failed us. I learned a very important lesson on Monday, DO NOT give people an extra lane for travel unless you commit to it for the long hull. With the heavy traffic an extra lane for a mile or so is useless. Now, when the highway opened up to a four-lane expressway near Tomahawk, which it followed all the way to Interstates 90 and 94 then traffic was moving much more freely. Even if the road was still crowded you were able to make some good speed along the highway.
From Portage through Madison and Beloit the interstate was crowded. I figured it was bound to happen but needless to say I had never been more happy to see Illinois than last Monday. The tollways and expressways of northeastern Illinois worked wonderfully and I was able to make it across the Chicago area in just over an hour. It drove through the early part of the night back across Indiana including a couple of heavy storms around Lafayette. I was very surprised to hear then that Indianapolis has had only 0.02 inches of rain this entire month. Still I was home just after 11:00 in the evening after having started just after 7:15 in Houghton. Amazingly this was not the most I had driven in one day, but it was the most I had driven in one direction in a single day and the most I had driven in one day in my current car. Needless to say I needed a break after this trip.
Still, it was beautiful country and I feel very jealous for those in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota who have access to all this scenery. With the West Coast on fire, the southeast having to deal with hurricanes and the southwest all dry it’s nearly perfect up there. I would like to head back up there sometime, maybe do more of the Keweenaw Peninsula and around Marquette, that was a very interesting and active city up there.