Up to the UP through the Michigan Mitten





Things I knew about Michigan.  My Dad lived there as a kid, cars were made there at some point in history, and boasts a Big-10 college where a lot of college football is played. 

What I took in was acres of farmland, miles of oceanfront and the largest Santa Claus in the largest Christmas Village in the US.  Driving straight up Michigan, there were many curiosity stops along the way.  I spent a night on a working farm herbal farm, I shopped at the largest Christmas store in a VERY German-like town called Frankenmuth, drove alongside an antique tractor crossing parade (over the historic 5 mile-long Mackinaw Bridge), and ate picnic lunches along side all the great lakes Huron, Superior and Michigan.  I didn't even realize that by the time I get over the bridge and reach the Upper Peninsula, I will have traversed all of the Great Lakes.  That is something I will have bragging rights that I didn't realize with where I was going.  Wanderlust is pretty cool and that word is still not yet old.  



I stayed overnight at a hilarious spot called Big Buck Brewery.  It would have been so much more fun if it wasn't 40 degrees out.  I chose this because it was supposed to have a cool outdoor dining area where you could take dogs.  Not on my visit.  Rye had his half of a burger in the camper when I got back from the brewery.  It was so cold, I had to pull out the ski base layers and wear a hat to bed.  The next morning, I got up and got to the gas station and grabbed a coffee inside.  Still in the Aprés-ski outfit from the night before, an older gentleman looked at me and with a newly sounding mid-west accent said, "Lady, look at you with that hat on! Haven't you heard, it's going to be 90 here by noon?"  Too bad I wasn't sticking around Gaylord, Michigan.  I had a bigger day ahead of me. 




I was elevating further north to Calumet, MI.  This is where I will have human interaction for the first time in days.  This is where I would find my lost band member, my old partner in crime, my ride or die, my soul sister.  I'm on a quest to find a certain National Park Ranger in the upper peninsula of the copper land in Calumet, MI.  


Location: Calumet, Calumet Twp, MI 49913, USA
Like Homer, coming out of a many year journey of what seems like a Trojan War, or PCSD (post COVID stress disorder), I am on a significant life journey. Literal or metaphorically, I am about to soak in some transformative days, filled with experiences that will hopefully redefine my understanding of life and the world around me, without any distractions of other's human conditions. ME TIME.

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