While in the upper peninsula (locals call it the UP) of Michigan, we visited Tahquemenon Falls on the Tahquemenon River. It’s a beautiful area and the falls, while not tall, are very splendid. The water is a unique copper color due to the large amount of tannic acid in the area which leeches into the river and shows wonderfully in the falls. There are two areas with falls, one is larger and has dug a gorge just below the falls, and the other area is around a bend of the river with an island at the center and several short falls around both sides of the island.

The viewpoints are a short distance from the road and an easy walk. At the gorge you can go down 116 steps to view the waterfall and gorge, but then you have to come back up those 116 steps. We decided to bypass that.

Then, we travelled to a northern point of the UP called WhiteFish Point, where Lake Superior narrows to a point at the eastern end. This area is called the Shipwreck Coast because of the fog, storms, and how close the ships must pass to each other in the narrow area. There have been many shipwrecks in this area, the first in the early 1800s and the latest one in 1975 when the Edmund Fitzgerald went down quickly and all 29 crew were lost in a storm.

The Shipwreck Museum has information and artifacts from several wrecks that have been visited by divers to bring up artifacts. The Edmund Fitzgerald was visited in 1995 and the ship’s bell was brought up. A replacement bell inscribed with the names of the 29 crewmembers was taken down to replace it at the wreck to serve as a permanent memorial. All 29 are still entombed there.

Here are pictures we took of the falls, the museum and whiteFish Point: