Most people believe the entire state of MI is within the Great Lakes Watershed.
But this is not true.
These coordinates will take one to a small ditch in the lower peninsula which reaches the Mississippi via the Kankakee river. 41°46’17.9"N 86°27’55.3"W
And these coordinates will take one to Misery Creek, which flows into Lac Vieux Desert in MI’s UP, a lake that drains into the Mississippi via the Wisconsin river. 46.162811, -89.111886
I just HAD to share that. Thanks for indulging me.
Please share your geographic facts upon which you dwell incessantly.
ok, that did not go the way it should, and editing doesn’t fix it.
it refuses to include the other comment and link I wrote:
And these coordinates will take one to Misery Creek, which flows into Lac Vieux Desert in MI’s UP, a lake that drains into the Mississippi via the Wisconsin river. 46.162811, -89.111886
OK, links are working intermittently, and sometimes only if you click to open them in a new tab. Sorry about that, but I think it’s the board that’s wonky
Kaskaskia, IL is the only Illinois town west of the Mississippi. And only because the river decided to follow a new course after a flood and screw everyone up.
I live near the headwaters of the St John’s River and it’s been so canalized and dredged and managed that it’s difficult to tell where the north-draining river begins, the east-draining canals begin, and where the swamps in between end. The semi-official source is a little north of my link, called Lake Hell ‘n’ Blazes, sometimes bowdlerized into Lake Helen Blazes.
Here’s a list of Unusual drainage systems, including Isa Lake, WY which drains into both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans (how cool is that?), and Tonlé Sap river, which flows north in the wet season and south in the dry season.
Digging around, I discovered that the waterway that drains MI’s lower peninsula into the Mississippi is called Grapevine Creek. In the 1830’s there were plans to run a canal from Lake Erie at Toledo to Lake Michigan at Michigan City, IN by using various waterways, including Grapevine Creek.
I thought it was cool to drive from Istanbul (on the Eurasian Tectonic Plate) to the rest of Turkey (on the Anatolian Tectonic Plate) via the Bosphorus Strait Bridge. I’m not positive, but I think it’s the only city in the world that straddles two plates.
No, no, don’t cross the streams!
ETA: Thanks for these, everyone! I’m making a poster along with the usual suspects like Port Roberts, WA and Lake of the Woods, MN for my niece and her kids.
