Our time in Yooperland

Yoopers are folks who live in the UP. That is Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I know most anyone else already knows that bit of info but it was news to me. We have packed a bunch into the last couple days and I want to get a post done before we move on. When we stopped at the St Croix River visitor center near Trego the volunteers gave us a few very helpful suggestions for enjoying the UP. 

Our first night on Lake Superior was in the village of L'Anse. I was so excited to be at the Great Lakes I baked a crazy cake to celebrate. I was also pretty happy to be somewhere where it is cool enough to use the oven. The chairs hanging on the back of the bike carrier made a pretty good cooling rack.

Our next area to explore some of was the Pictured Rocks Nat'l Lakeshore. We made our base at Munising in a city operated campground. The lakeshore with a view of Grand Island is only a 100' away from the camper. We took a cruise/tour to see the lakeshore here are a few of those pictures:

The pictures don't begin to do the scenery justice. The cliffs are up to 200' high. The colors are created by minerals that seep out of the porous sandstone. We took the cruise Sunday late afternoon. 

After the cruise, we stopped for dinner at Muldoon's for a Pasty. A local meat pie, theirs was voted best in the UP plus Trip advisor gave them a good rating. Umm a tasty pastry filled with beef, potato, carrots and rutabaga. I ate it before I thought of taking a picture, so I apologize for there being no visual. 

A big thunderstorm with lots of rain came in about 3 am yesterday. It made everything very wet but also cleared out the sky so the rest of Monday was a beautiful day. We took an afternoon sea kayak trip to get up close to the shore rocks. 

Here is our guide, Haily with a young passenger. 

We were able to get right in close to the rocks and mini caves created by the wave action of the lake. 

Here is the inside view. 

This is the view from the other side. 

And this is the "bird's eye" from land later in the day. To be on the safe side we took our older iPhone 3 out in the kayak. 

I am not sure how I got this shot, but it is an interesting one!  After the kayaking in and out it Miner's Beach we decided it would be our best opportunity for a Superior dip. 

We both got in, but I stayed in a little longer than Dan. It was COLD but refreshing. 

We enjoyed a great sunset last night. 

While we were kayaking, our guide asked several of us "If you could go on an adventure anywhere in the world, what would it be?"  Dan's answer was that he is on it. How would you answer?

I will see you down the road...jb