Michigan's Upper Peninsula Top 10 Vacation Destination

Michigan's Upper Peninsula has joined the likes of the Greek Islands, London, Russia, and Scandanavia as a Top 10 summer vacation destination according to ShermansTravel.com. The website touts itself as "your unbiased guide to top deals and destinations." How cool is it to have the spotlight on the U.P.? We could certainly use the good stories about our state to help our tourism industry.

Here is what ShermansTravel.com has to say about our beloved Upper Peninsula:

"If city-living gets too hot, pack up some marshmallows, hot dogs, and camping gear and head to the refreshing Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where majestic wildlife, unspoiled rivers, waterfalls, and dense forests abound. Blessed with some 1700 miles of shoreline along three of the Great Lakes – Superior, Michigan and Huron – it should come as no surprise that fishing, canoeing, and camping are prime activities here, with moose, bears, and beavers as common companions. The region’s strong Native American and French Canadian heritage are experienced everywhere as well; enclaves with names like Sault Ste-Marie and bridges like the Mackinac hearken back to the days of the earliest settlers. You’ll probably feel like one of North America’s earliest explorers yourself as you paddle the waterways here and set up camp in the woods."

Thanks to an article in The Mining Journal that pointed this great news out.

Detroit Free Press Turns 175 on May 5, 2006

As Cliff Clavin (from the popular Cheers television show) might say - it's a little known fact that the Detroit Free Press will celebrate it's 175th year of existence on May 5, 2006. All week long the Free Press will be featuring bits of trivia from its history. A quick piece of trivia from today's article -

"the Detroit Free Press has outlasted nearly all its peers, becoming the second-oldest continuously operated business in Michigan."

Plant a Tree For Arbor Day

Thanks to the Detroit Free Press I found out that today, April 28, is Arbor Day. The article in the Free Press has a handful of stories about people and their thoughts about trees and why they planted them. I remember when I was in elementary school and we had a field trip in the spring to the covered bridge in Centreville. They had all sorts of outdoor activities and information about the environment. We learned about planting trees to protect areas from erosion and received a White Pine seedling to take home and plant.

Looking back, I can't believe how excited I was to have a tree for a present. I planted and watered that little seedling and before you knew it that little pine was really growing.

Unfortunately, my little pine tree didn't make it too many years. I cannot remember the exact cause of its demise. It was either as a result of some free-range chickens roosting in it at night or the time our calves got out and one of them chomped the top of the tree clean off.

We had a few little pine trees at the time, so I don't remember which event killed my tree. I know that my tree was one of the two that were finished off by farm animals.

I wish we had more room to plant trees where we live. If we did, we would definitely be planting a tree today.

View Shipwrecks From Lake Superior's Shore

A lot of Michiganians long to see one of the Great Lakes infamous shipwrecks. For those of you who want to get a good view of shipwrecks without the use of scuba gear, I know just the place. Up across the Mighty Mac in Yooper territory on the Lake Superior side you can see a string of wrecks from the shore. Hurricane River Campground is located about 12 miles west of Grand Marais (at the eastern edge of the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore). This is where you will find your shipwrecks. You don't have to pay to get in to the campground and see the ruins.

The east end of the campground has a sign at the trailhead of the Lakeshore Trail that reads "Shipwreck" and points you towards the beach. Wooden ribs of a ship stand about 20 yards out from shore. Another mile down the trail finds more ruins on the beach. Jutting up from the sand are the scattered remains of a couple of hulls.

If you wish to see Au Sable Light Station, just travel another half-mile long trail and you will see the restored light. The National Park Service has restored the light and outbuildings. A fairly short hike and plenty to see make this a great stop when traveling in the Upper Peninsula.

History of Au Sable Light and pictures. You can also sign up to be a live-in volunteer to staff the lighthouse museum and station. Volunteer.gov has an application you can download and mail in. Sounds like a great summer vacation if you can afford the time off of work.

You also might wish to visit the Picture Rocks National Lakeshore website.

In Praise of my Spam Filter

I have to give my blog's spam filter it's due. In the last 24 hours alone it has probably caught about two dozen spam comments. In case you don't know, there are actually people who created software that puts links to their (and others) websites of dubious nature in the comments of blogs. I love this blog software, Wordpress and I currently use Spam Karma 2 to catch all of that junk. It does an excellent job. I like being able to have people comment without me having to review their comments before they are posted.

Spam Karma 2 lets me do that with the piece of mind that no nasty stuff will make it through. I would like to coin a new (at least to me anyway) phrase related to Blog Spam - BLAM. Blog is short for web log and BLAM will now be known as the shortened version of blog spam.

Just send me the credit (or money :)) whenever you use the term.

Speaking of Alternative Fuels

Just came across this while reading one of my favorite blogs - Make (all about making stuff). You can purchase a dvd that shows you how to convert your standard diesel powered vehicle to one supplemented with used vegetable oil at http://vegmyride.tv. For $19.95 they show you how to run a duel-tank system (meaning you still have your factory installed diesel engine and tank) so you can still run on standard diesel whenever you please. They figure that by running on used veggie oil your cost per gallon is $.15. Wonder if your exhaust smells like french fries. Man, that would be cool. :)

It isn't a Michigan-based company, but the concept is too cool not to share. Especially when gas (and diesel) is $3 a gallon.