Lake Superior Circle Tour Day 4 - Bayfield to Grand Marais

This is the day of the Apostle Islands cruise and we have more unique rocks to look forward to.

Woke up to a beautiful morning in Bayfield with birds chirping outside.  I even caught a few of the birds on camera, including a yellow warbler and an early robin that caught and lost a worm.  Although we have a boat to catch, we did have some time to walk around town a bit.

Golden hour outside the motel

Yellow warbler

Robin lost its worm!

Sculpture by local artist - there were quite a few displayed out the house

There are ferries to most of the Apostle Islands, the largest of which is Madeline Island, the spiritual center of the Chippewa.  It now has a large state park.

While it looked like a sunny day on shore, it was cold and windy by the time we got on the upper deck of the catamaran.  Most people didn't hang around the upper deck for long, it must be more than 10 degrees warmer in the cabin!  

Some of the islands are state parks and volunteers are allowed to stay on in settlements like this one in return for work. The National Parks Service will even pay volunteers $3 per 8 hour day worked but they have to provide their own food and supplies.  In return they can put this down as work experience on their resume for the future. - an interesting exchange.

Some of the more interesting rock formations on the islands - this one looks like a ship

I was lucky to catch two bald eagles fighting off Hermit Island but not alert enough to extend my lens so these were all shot at a mere 100mm, not enough to get a sharp image but enough to tell a story.  That is a problem with always doing my birding with a prime lens that doesn't need to be extended!  Habits die hard. You can also see the impressive wing span of the eagles.

Encounter

Entanglement

Eviction 

Escape

    

Devil's Island was the most interesting of the islands with a lighthouse and sandstone caves all around its rim.

Raspberry Island with its lighthouse which is actually a house!

The cruise was a good two and a half hours long.  We got off the boat and headed off to lunch before hitting the road again.  We had four stops on the way to Grand Marais, our overnight stop before the U.S. Canada border.   We drove through Duluth and it was the first time we saw factories and industrial buildings along the lake shore.  

Duluth from the highway

It turned out that we missed three of the stops in Minnesota because of rain.  We didn't make it to Gooseberry Falls, Split Rock, and Palisade Head (not even for a quick photo because it required clambering over wet rocks).  We did see Stoney Point and the fishing shack that used to be used by commercial fishermen. 

Stoney Point

Fishing shack apparently much photographed under various conditions, sunrise, golden hour, snow, stormy weather, etc,  In this case, it's just dramatic clouds...

In spite of the rain on the road, we made it to Artists' Point in Grand Marais for the golden hour even though the sun barely made it out for a few minutes.  It was nevertheless a good omen for the rest of the trip - no more rain!

Lake Superior Circle Tour Day 3 - Munising to Bayfield

Day 3 was a more relaxing day driving from Munising to Bayfield with no boat to catch. We started off with the impressive Lower Harbor Ore Dock in Marquette, a short drive from Munising.  It's an unusual structure dating from 1857, a relic of the iron ore mining industry, once used to load ore onto Lake freighters in Marquette. 

Lower Harbor Ore Dock

 We checked out three waterfalls, the first of which is Bond Falls in the Ottawa Haight Township in Michigan.  This is a beautiful full waterfall accessible via only a short hike.  

Bond Falls

We crossed the stateline between Michigan and Wisconsin and noticed that Wisconsin is quite neat and green.  The Visitor Centre wasn't open but at least the washrooms were.  We may have missed the second waterfall on the state border, Interstate Falls.  We managed to see what we thought was part of it at least, possibly a lower section.  But we had a nice walk in the forest seeing trilliums and trout lilies by the trail.

Interstate Falls? sure doesn't look like what's online...

Walk through the forest - lots of trilliums

Potato Falls is quite attractive in spite of the name!

  

Our last stop before Bayfield was Ashland with its murals and a well-stocked Co-op.  Delicious scones here!  The murals were quite interesting, including one of the Ore Dock and many others of historical significance that were quite well done.  Even the recycling bins were decorated with stained glass!

The Ore dock mural

Both these murals of houses blended right in!

Stained glass decorated bin

We arrived in Bayfield in time for a nice dinner at the Bayfield Inn - Lake Superior White fish and the best ever clam chowder, chock full of clams!  Our hotel is at the waterfront and provided another opportunity to catch the blue hour after sunset even though we couldn't see the actual sunset.

Whitefish taco

Bayfield at dusk

  

Blue hour at Bayfield - the large island out there is Madeline Island

Lake Superior Circle Tour Day 2 - Munising

The highlight of our trip was the Pictured Rocks Cruise - this is what's in store for us!

The second day was one of the longest days on the trip. We started out at 8 am and managed to get back to our overnight hotel just before sunset.  We left Bay City and headed north to Mackinaw City, reaching the Mackinac Bridge in 3 hours. The bridge reminded me very much of the Golden Gate even though it's not the same colour.  It spans the channel that divides Lake Michigan from Lake Huron.  

We continued north to Grand Marais, Michigan, visiting Sable Falls and the Grand Sable Dunes which gave us our first view of Lake Superior.  It was a beautiful blue.

Sable Falls

Grand Sable Dunes

We had booked the 5 pm Pictured Rocks Cruise at Munising so we drove non-stop from the Dunes to Munising, allowing us time to check into the hotel before grabbing a quick bite before the cruise.  It was a sunny day but windy and cold. I was wrapped up in 6 layers as we had planned to stay on the open upper deck so we could take photos of the rocks.  The sea was also choppy, so I was glad I had my sea-bands with me. When the captain offered a full refund to anyone with sea-sickness, I know I needed my sea-bands!

TIPS:  1. Choose the late afternoon cruises to get the most colour out of the rocks.         

2. Be prepared for the weather to change so best to wear layers.   

3. The word on the street is to sit on the right side of the boat but according to the captain, it doesn't make any difference as he would turn the boat around on the return trip and people on the left side of the boat would have their turn to be closer to the shore.  This turned out to be true although on our cruise, there were many empty seats to choose from, especially on the upper deck!

4. Try to book a lake front hotel.  Sunset on the lake is quite special.

What follows are photos of the highlights on the cruise.  As you can see, it is not called Pictured Rocks for no reason.  It was a spectacular display of multi-coloured rocks and the late afternoon soon brought it all out.  The later photos were taken on the return trip and you may notice that the colours are more intense in these photos - we hit the golden hour (2 hours before sunset) on the way back.  To top it all off, we had a brilliant sunset and the ambient light after sunset turned the lake in front of our hotel a lovely pink during the blue hour.

Eastern Channel Lighthouse

Miners' Castle

One of many painted coves

Lovers' Leap

One of my favourites "Rainbow Cave"

Indian head

Grand Portal

Flower vase

Indian drum

Battleship rocks

The most spectacular formation - Chapel Rock and Chapel Cove, the catamaran actually drove into the cove.

An impressive example of nature at work - see how the roots of the tree span the gap between the rocks!

Spray Falls - this is where we turned around and see the colours have intensed with the golden hour

These rocks have no name but I just love the rainbow colours on them!

Sunset at the hotel

Ambient light from the sun turned the sky pink during blue hour