My sister and I are going to be in Michigan for several days in mid-October. We’ll be flying into Grand Rapids and then staying somewhere near Boyne City. We’ll have two full days to do some sight-seeing (I’ll have a third day to myself while she’s busy) and then we’ll need to be back in Grand Rapids on the last day by about 5pm.
Any recommendations for places to visit and good restaurants? We won’t be far from the UP, so I do think we’d like to go there for a day. And for our last day, is there somewhere between Boyne City and Grand Rapids that we should try to visit? At least one website predicts we’ll be there right around the peak for fall colors so we’re definitely excited about that!
If you go to the U.P. I think most people visiting for the first time just stay on I-75 north after crossing the bridge. But I always recommend taking highway US 2 after the bridge. It heads west, staying close to the Lake Michigan shore. It’s a beautiful, gem of a drive.
There’s a place called Gustafson’s in the town of Brevort that has the best smoked fish and beef jerky I have ever tried (and I’ve tried a lot).
Farther along US 2, between Brevort and Epoufette, is the Cut River Bridge. You can look down from it into a valley that has amazing Fall colors during peak season (though mid-October will probably be a bit past peak in the U.P.).
Thank you @Mean_Mr.Mustard and @solost those are some very helpful suggestions! Those look like beautiful drives, and I appreciate the tip about deviating off of I-75. I have never had smoked fish, so may have to try that…
@jnglmassiv I’m from Oklahoma, the Wild West of medical marijuana. Cheap pot is plentiful here
Since you only have a couple days, if you decide to stay more local, there’s the Traverse City / Grand Traverse area just southwest of Boyne City, which is also absolutely beautiful, and there’s lots to see and do. A drive up and down the Old Mission Peninsula is very scenic, and there’s a lot of wineries along the way. I had a terrific pan-seared walleye meal at The Peninsula Grill last Summer.
The town of Leland, on Michigan’s ‘little finger’ is a pretty little former fishing village that my wife and I spent a few days at for our anniversary years ago. We stayed at the Falling Waters Hotel, where you can fish right off the balcony into the Leland River that runs into Lake Michigan. Here’s a pic I took of Leland back then:
I’m generally not crazy about freshwater fish but smoked Great Lakes chubs, whitefish, and herring are among my favorite delicacies of all time. Fried smelt are also a treat but that’s a Spring thing. Neither are all that easy to find here in Chicago, I’m sorry to say.
And you might need to recalibrate what ‘cheap pot’ means, especially coming from a prohibition state, I know I did. $50 ounces and $10 1000mg THC cartridges.
The smoked lake trout at Gustafson’s in Brevort off hghway US 2 in the U.P., that I previously mentioned, is fantastic. I always get the lake trout and the beef jerky whenever I’m up there.
Hell, my wife and I are planning a trip to Wisconsin in a week, since we’ve never been there, but I’m starting to think I want to go back to my beloved upper Michigan again now!
Thanks for the additional recommendations! We’ve never been to this area so it’s nice to get first-hand accounts (and now I will have to eat smoked fish).
$30/oz is common here, not sure about the cartridges. 1000 mg edibles are generally $10-15. We have far more dispensaries than CO or MI - I think only California has more. I wasn’t joking when I said it was the wild west!
I went there for the first time a couple of years ago and got some great recommendations in this thread!
I drove through the UP a few years ago. Although I certainly didn’t see all of it, I can certainly recommend visiting Tahquamenon Falls State Park, about a 90 minute drive north of Mackinaw City. And I would echo the recommendation by @solost about US 2. Gorgeous drive, with little traffic, at least in late September, when I was there.
Heh, I took a look at that thread and saw a post from me linking to a thread I made, asking about Wisconsin trip ideas 6 years before that (a trip that ended up not happening).
What did you end up doing in Wisconsin?
ETA: never mind, I see you made a follow-up post in your Wisconsin thread, duh.
It’s a natural spring near Manistique. It has a glass bottom boat you can ride across. You can see as clear as day down to the bottom. Where there are huge fish, swimming, lazing, you know fish stuff. It is beautiful and amazing.g
Jeez, that’s crazy. Like, why do they even charge at all?
Is it a ‘medical use only but eveyone gets a card’ system? Any chance for tourists to buy medicine when they’re visiting?
Sorry to continue this side discussion, but I read recently about the oversaturation of the market in MI. So many stores opening up, prices are dropping and some major players are getting out of the market.
Hard to believe OK - w/ a pop of 4 mill and change, has more dispensaries than CO - nearly 6 mill, or MI - over 10 mill. I believe you. But DAMN! That’s a lotta stoner Sooners!
I just got back from New Buffalo at the southwestern tip of Michigan (very nice area, though not relevant to this thread), which has gone from no dispensaries to over a dozen of them in the last few years. I think they primarily serve the needs of Indianans; once you get 10-20 miles from the border, almost every billboard on I-94 in Indiana is advertising weed.
I live in Chicago and visit Michigan once a year; it’s been years since I’ve purchased weed in Illinois. (I go for vacation, but if you smoke much at all, it’s extremely cost-effective to make a special trip just to shop).
If you manage to get over the bridge (switch from being a “troll” to being a “Yooper”) try to get over to Germfask and visit Benny the Beard Fisher
But beware. My experiences with UP drivers hasn’t been pleasant. I’ve had to pull onto the shoulder a couple of times to avoid oncoming cars. They like to pass on the shoulders, too.
That looks gorgeous! I’m not sure that we’ll make it that far west on the UP (it’ll be about 3 hours one way from our home base) but we’ll definitely swing by there if we do wander that far.
Also, a lot of recommendations I see are for the more western side of the UP vs the east - is there a reason for that? Or do most people not make it very fast east?
Some of those are perfectly located for our ramblings…
And thanks for the warning RAWDuke - hopefully the worst of the tourists will be gone by mid-October?
Medical only but it’s ridiculously easy to get. Visitors can buy but I’m not sure what they have to do to get a card. But it being medical is actually good as it offers job protection - if you aren’t in a “safety sensitive” position you can’t be fired for failing a drug screen.
They’ve been cracking down (which was badly needed) but there has got to be massive amounts of money laundering and illegal export of product to other states. On one major street there’s over a dozen dispensaries within a mile, and I almost never sees cars at some of them. No way they’re legit businesses.
