Tahquamenon Falls

Welcome to the U.P. where people say a lot of "Eh" and refer to themselves as "Yoopers".  After a long bike ride yesterday in Mackinac, we were a little sore, but not as sore as we were after today's journey.

Upon crossing into the U.P.,  we headed straight for the Tahquamenon Falls, which are located in the Tahquamenon Falls State Park.  We decided to park at the Lower Falls and hike the 4.5 mile river trail up to the Upper Falls.

Here's the general layout of the Lower Falls.  We basically viewed the falls starting from the black box pretty much in the middle of this picture. We then walked to the left all the way around that big hump following the trail that ran off this map on the lower left side.

At first glimpse and from a distance the Lower Falls didn't really impress us; however, when we hovered over the edge of some of the closer viewing areas, we instantly fell in love with the roaring rapids.  There is a service provided by the park where you can rent a canoe to take out to an island in the river which supposedly gives the best views of the falls.  But we had a long hike ahead of us.

The Tahquamenon Falls are known for their unique color as the brownish-bronze comes from tannic acid of decaying cedars and hemlocks that line the banks.

Throughout most of the trail to the Upper Falls, we hiked along the 94-mile Tahquamenon River eventually empties in Lake Superior near that town of Paradise that we passed.  We crossed several boardwalks throughout the trail that we assume were constructed by the park.  Some even were built on a slant to preserve the natural environment. Halfway there, the roots and rocks weren't as prominent along the trail which made it easier. However, we did climb up and down a lot.

After about 1.5 (averaging 20 minutes/mile) hours, we made it to a crazy staircase to give us this view of the Upper Falls. The Upper Falls have a 50-foot drop, creating a fountain of water 200 feet wide. These are the second-largest falls (by volume) east of the Mississippi, outdone only by the Niagara Falls. This fact really surprised us.

The bubbling of the water comes from the high salt content. The Upper Falls have a 50-foot drop, creating a fountain of water 200 feet wide.

The hike back took us 1 hour 20 minutes, so the round-trip was about 3-3.5 hours if you're hiking at rigorous pace Scottie sets for me. We noted that opting for our water Keens versus the hiking Keens was probably a mistake as our feet not only stunk on the ensuing car ride, but they were dirty.

We drove back to the Upper Falls where the Tahquamenon Brewery resided.  Time to reward ourselves for the 3 hours / 8 miles of hiking!  These were the selections of beer on tap, so guess what we ordered? Hooray, samplers!  Here are the results of our sampling...

Beer Sampled	Scottie	Lindsay
Harvest Wheat Ale
Porcupine Pale Ale
Black Bear Stout
Blueberry Ale

With a limited amount of daylight, we skipped Whitefish Point heading straight to the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore for a quick .4 mile hike to the Log Slide viewpoint.  Looking east, we saw the stretch of the national lakeshore called the Grand Sable Banks, where 200-foot sand dunes are hemmed by a 12-mile ribbon of sand and pebble beach (Moon Travel Book). While we didn't hike out to the Au Sable Point Lighthouse, I was able to get a glimpse of it through the telephoto lens, so that counts as a check on my list!

Along the path, we also learned about the logging industry that was once prominent in this area.  In the 1880s, during the white pine lumber era, before railroads, logs were hauled to this point by horse teams, then slid down a log flume to Lake Superior.  They were boomed up into large rafts towed to Grand Marais sawmill.

As the darkness set in, we took the windy driving path into Munising to find our motel, the Sunset Motel on the Bay.  We were happy not only to arrive to a beautiful sunset over the bay, but also to a clean room.  Upon the recommendation of our friendly check-in lady, we settled into Sydney's Restaurant for some cherry burgers, Keweenaw Widow Maker Black Ale, and the opening game of the 2011-2012 NFL season.  Hooray!

More photos can be found in my photo album and here's a link to the map we used to guide us throughout the trip.  This is also a great site with guides to the U.P.