Trip Summary Trip Dates: 1 Sep 03 - Sep 12 Trip Dates: 2 Sep 14 - Sep 23 Start - End Locations: 1 Petosky, Michigan - Petosky, Michigan Start - End Locations: 2 Petosky, Michigan - Petosky, Michigan Days: 10   Rest Days: 0   Level of Support: Self-contained Miles: 387 Average Miles Per Day: 43 Surface: Paved Riders: 1 14 Riders: 2 14 Type: Self-Contained   Meals: Shared cooking Physical Difficulty: Intermediate   Airport: Traverse City, Michigan Cost: $999 Trip: 1 Booking Status: Approx. Half Full Trip: 2 Booking Status: Full

New England may attract the lion’s share of “leaf peepers” to its colorful fall foliage displays, but Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (UP) puts on an autumn show that some say rivals anything you can find in the far Northeast. That’s why we’ve scheduled this unique tour for that time of year. We’ve also researched a route that’s low in both traffic and hills, and hammered out an itinerary featuring moderate daily riding distances—all making this a good choice for your first self-contained tour (not that seasoned veterans won’t love it, too!). We’ll have the opportunity to camp on three of the five Great Lakes and spend a day on Mackinac Island, where you’ll feel right at home, because the only vehicles permitted are the two-wheeled variety like you’ll be aboard.

In Harbor Springs, we’ll pass through an area of summer cottages built and vacationed in by the upper crust of Detroit early in the twentieth century. Farther along, en route to Harbor Springs, we’ll be treated to magnificent, ocean-like views of Lake Michigan. Taking advantage of the Mackinac Bridge Authority’s shuttle service, we’ll hitch a ride over the renowned “Big Mac,” which turned fifty in 2007. At five miles long, it is the third-longest suspension bridge in the world and it incorporates an astounding 42,000 miles of wire in its main cables.

Safe back on land on the UP, we’ll ride along the north shore of Lake Michigan before turning inland to follow a seemingly endless network of deserted back roads. But suddenly, just like that, we’ll pop back out at Lake Superior’s Whitefish Bay, site of a 1975 shipwreck that was memorialized a year later in Gordon Lightfoot’s evocative hit song The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

Entering Sault Ste. Marie, we’ll visit the famous Soo Locks, where watercraft large and small are raised or lowered to permit passage between Lake Superior and Lake Huron (the latter’s surface elevation is about twenty-five feet lower than that of Superior). Paralleling the Lake Huron shore, we’ll visit the tourist town of St. Ignace, situated in the shadows of the Mackinac Bridge’s north end. Here we’ll definitely want to try out a pasty or two—that delicious, hard-to-crush meat-and-potatoes pie that was a diet staple of Cornish miners.

The next morning we’ll catch an early ferry to Mackinac Island. We’ll spend most of the day wandering around this uncommonly quiet and beautiful little place, where folk get around on foot or by bicycle. Later in the day we’ll catch another ferry back to Mackinaw City and celebrate our final night on the trail; the next morning, we’ll close the loop by way of an inland route traversing attractive farm country and gently rolling hills.

The car may be king in Detroit and other points south in Michigan, but on the UP it is the bicycle that rules. Join in the fun on this very special fall tour to learn what we mean.

For more detailed information, see Self Contained trip logistics.

READY TO GO?
You can sign up for the Great Lakes tour now. Go to our online sign-up.