This year, my wife and I celebrated our fifth anniversary. To honor that achievement (no small feat, half a decade with me), we wanted to plan something big. But then… COVID changed our plans. Rather than take a trip abroad, we had to rethink. Since we couldn’t add a country, what about another state? Looking at a map, we realized that the closest state to us that we both hadn’t visited was Michigan.
Even more conveniently, the Upper Peninsula was a pretty straight shot for us through Wisconsin from the Twin Cities where we live. Four-ish hour drive and another state to add to the list? Why not.
THE DIGS
We decided on Ironwood, Michigan as it had quick and easy access to our beloved Lake Superior.
Still in the thick of COVID-19, we figured we should go the AirBnB route. Less public areas, less interaction, etc. We settled on a nice little place called Judi’s Place. Sue was honestly one of the best AirBnb hosts we’ve ever had. Super friendly, responsive, and kind. If anyone finds themselves in need of a place to stay in Ironwood, this was a great spot!
THE WATERFALLS
Waterfall sightseeing was the main prerogative of our Ironwood, Michigan trip. For whatever reason, I’m always a sucker for naturally running water, be it rivers, creeks, or waterfalls. Our AirBnb host had a great list of waterfalls to visit in the binder she left for us, so we made our way through it throughout the weekend.
Check out the YouTube video I made for a more visual display of what we saw. I brought my drone and got some great footage of the various waterfalls we hiked around.
BOND FALLS
The most impressive and massive waterfall we saw was Bond Falls. An easy, one-hour drive got us to a parking lot outside of Bond Falls Scenic Site.
A bit of an oopsie: you have to pay cash in the “honor policy” cash box. You fill out a bit of information on the envelope and drop in your cash. Or at least that’s what you’re supposed to do…
We didn’t have cash so technically entered this park illegally, with the pact between the two of us to pay it later. For non-Michigan residents, we were supposed to pay $9. It’s $13 for Michigan residents.
After feeling like fugitives, we walked the short path to the trail loop around the falls. You hear it before you see it as you walk up, and it’s gorgeous. I got a lot of great photos and drone footage, particularly since we went early in the morning before any crowd.
We walked the trail from both the left and right angles to get as many photos as possible. Despite the beauty of the actual falls, we were ready to leave after an hour or so.
5 WATERFALLS ON THE BLACK RIVER
We headed back to Ironwood to think about our afternoon. After a luxurious Subway lunch, we decided to head to a series of five waterfalls on the Black River that eventually spill out into Lake Superior. It was a bit of a shorter drive to see these: about 30 minutes from the AirBnB in Ironwood.
As we drove north towards Lake Superior, there were small parking lots right off the highway to see the individual falls. There are short, fairly easy trails down to see the water – none more than a mile. The five waterfalls we saw, in order, were Great Conglomerate Falls, Potawatomi Falls, Gorge Falls, Sandstone Falls, and Rainbow Falls. All were beautiful, some with better angles to see than others (Potawatomi was particularly hard to get good footage of from the trail).
After our tour de falls, we parked at the Black River Harbor Pavilion to see our beloved Lake Superior. We parked in the much larger parking lot at the entrance of the park.
We redeemed ourselves for “stealing” our visit to Bond Falls by overpaying on this visit. To make up for our cheating at Bond Falls, we paid $20 in our cash envelope here when we only needed $5. Hopefully our karma is back even at least.
There is a short walk across a nice suspension bridge to get to the beach. We relaxed a little bit on the sand then headed back to Ironwood to relax for the rest of the evening.
COPPER PEAK SKI JUMP
I’ll mentioned that on the way to the series of falls, we spontaneously stopped by the Copper Peak Ski Jump. The ski jump hosted several events and is now on the National Register of Historic Places. Fun fact: it remains the only ski flying facility in the western hemisphere (shrug, ok…).
Now a tourist attraction, you can pay to take an elevator up to the top. You get a really nice 360 view of the UP and Lake Superior. It should be noted that the wind RIPS at the top of the lift. To the point where my heights-averse wife stayed near the elevator and didn’t walk all the way up to the launch like I did. It’s definitely not for the faint of heart, so be wary of this when considering going up.
PORCUPINE MOUNTAINS OVERLOOK TRAIL
On our last full day (actual anniversary, woop!), we drove to the Porcupine Mountains. It’s another hour or so drive away from Ironwood.
It was a bit more popular of a place and we had to manage more traffic as we looked for the trail heads. We had settled on the “Overlook Trail” since it was about three miles and claimed to have a nice view of the Porcupine Mountains at the peak of the hike. The trailhead was a bit weird to find, as we drove around a bit before realizing it was just a pull-off area from the highway that could only hold maybe five vehicles.
I will also say that although the trail was allegedly 2.7 miles when we looked online, it seems like a lot more especially on a hot August afternoon. My wife’s Fitbit claimed we walked over three and a half miles, and my sweat-drenched body didn’t disagree.
The first half was almost entirely an uphill grade, which makes sense given it was an overlook trail. The second half of the loop is where the trail seemed to go super long. We even “saved” a young hiker who thought she was lost but we encouraged her to continue on with us.
LAKE OF THE CLOUDS
Although exhausted from our sweat hike, we decided to extend our stay in the area since we heard Lake of the Clouds was beautiful. We were glad we did: it definitely was.
Once you drive a bit further from the trailheads along the highway, you get to a park entrance booth that serves as the gateway to the Lake of the Clouds Overlook. After dropping cash in the paybox (we learned our lesson at Bond Falls), there was a short drive to a large parking lot that puts you within 100 yards of the overlook.
When I say 100 yards: it is paved but completely uphill. There’s a winding wooden ramp to get up if you’re bringing grandma up. Or even if you just hiked for 3+ miles and are all sweaty and tired and FEEL like a grandma.
We got some more photos and drone footage of Lake of the Clouds from the overlook. But, similar to Bond Falls, the overlook is the highlight attraction of the immediate area so we were ready to head back after a half hour or so.
WRAPPING UP
I’m sure you’ve realized by now that we actually didn’t spend a ton of time IN Ironwood, Michigan. However, I do think we made the right choice in using it as our base of operations for our anniversary weekend.
It’s a quiet town, has several restaurants (I do not recommend the Chinese…), and is within an hour of the major nature attractions that Mrs. Meticulous and I were interested in. Although we always would rather be getting additional stamps in our passports, we had a really nice weekend in Michigan’s UP and would definitely return for a visit.
