Our summer vacation in 2000 was spent camping our way around Lake Superior. We'd previously traveled its north shore up to Thunder Bay and its south shore as far as the Keweena Peninsula, but we'd never circled the entire lake before. We traveled clockwise. We spent our first night in Grand Marais, MN and our last night in Bayfield, WI. Those were are only hotel rooms. Other than that we stayed mostly in either national or provincial parks. We covered over 1400 miles in 8 days. A great trip, but that was just a little too much driving per day for our tastes. we felt like we didn't have enough time to get to know any one area. Next time, we'll take 2 weeks and spend a lot more time exploring. |
We stayed our first night in Grand Marias. The Beaver House bait shop is a local landmark. |
Lake Superior and Artist's Point from outside our hotel room. |
A little marina in Silver Islet near Sleeping Giant Provincial Park, Ontario. This was the first park we camped at on this trip. |
 The general store in Silver Islet was forever old and seemed to have one of everything. Silver Islet is small rocky at the tip of the Sibley Peninsula in northwestern Ontario. It's the site of the first silver mine in Ontario. |
We took a break at Jimmy's Chip Stand, an old school bus that served pretty good burgers. |
Lupines in bloom. |
We had a great camp site right next to the lake at Neys Provincial Park. Here's Gelina getting our lunch ready on one of the water-carved boulders along the beach. |
 The landscape at the park was just gorgeous. This is a little creek flowing into Superior. |
The beach at Neys. |
 Whitefish Point, MI is where the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum is located. |
 The museum at Whitefish Point is pretty impressive. This giant Fresnel lens is the largest lighthouse lens ever used on the Great Lakes.They also have a display of every major wreck in Lake Superior, including the bell of the Edmund Fitzgerald |
Whitefish Point is the site of site of the oldest active lighthouse on Lake Superior. The light keepers Quarters was built in 1861 and has been fully restored. |
12 Mile Beach is part of Michigan's Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. We could have spent the whole week here. |
 Gelina's "shortcut" led us to Earnest Hemingway's Big Two Hearted River in Michigan. |
This pine cone table decoration was waiting for us at our campsite on 12 Mile Beach. |
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 These gorgeous falls were just outside of Pictured Rocks. |