Been a busy year with work and a new baby at home, but I was able to escape for a few days of exploring Michigan's Upper Penninsula. We covered a lot of ground off road, the UP is full of trails and seasonal roads. My goals were to see some sites I haven't been to before, to camp on the shores of Lake Superior, and to paddle the Tahquamenon River.
The Xterra is working great for me, although I am finding that I am not using the awning as much as I thought I would, and I plan to build a paddle/fishing rod holder along the roof inside the cab. After a long time of fiddling with roof rack configurations, I'm going to try to run it as slick as possible for a while to save on wind noise, fuel, and snagging branches on trails.
We took an ATV trail by mistake at one point, which is meant for ATV's 50" wide or less. Once we got on there was no backing out so we had to make it work. Pucker factor was high on a very steep lateral incline, especially with the 80lb canoe on top, and a few steep hills with sharp turns at the end, but I made it work without any new fender damage.
Here's a few pics from the trip:
Final route. We didn't have many plans, just broke camp each day and set off to see something different.
5am fuel up (and clean truck) to start day one
The Tahquamenon River by canoe is very scenic
First trail we ducked onto off the pavement. Michigan has LOTS of sand!
Tourist stop for the Tahquamenon Falls. The rust color is from the tannins in the cedar swamps along the river
Campsite night one. On Lake Superior with nobody in sight except cargo barges. Maybe my favorite place I've slept so far.
A forest fire burned this area back in 2012, with over 20,000 acres burned. The underbrush and some trees are recovering, and it was a great spot for wild blueberries.
Lake Superior barely seen on the horizon
Narrow trails. My buddy's third gen 4Runner fit down them much better
Tourist stop to Miner's Castle at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore
Miner's Falls
Miner's River
Tourist stop to the Log Slide where they used to slide timber into the water for transport
Probably not enough to cause rocker damage, but the sliders earned their place to keep the body panels out of the rocks
Heading south on our way home
The Xterra is working great for me, although I am finding that I am not using the awning as much as I thought I would, and I plan to build a paddle/fishing rod holder along the roof inside the cab. After a long time of fiddling with roof rack configurations, I'm going to try to run it as slick as possible for a while to save on wind noise, fuel, and snagging branches on trails.
We took an ATV trail by mistake at one point, which is meant for ATV's 50" wide or less. Once we got on there was no backing out so we had to make it work. Pucker factor was high on a very steep lateral incline, especially with the 80lb canoe on top, and a few steep hills with sharp turns at the end, but I made it work without any new fender damage.
Here's a few pics from the trip:
Final route. We didn't have many plans, just broke camp each day and set off to see something different.
5am fuel up (and clean truck) to start day one
The Tahquamenon River by canoe is very scenic
First trail we ducked onto off the pavement. Michigan has LOTS of sand!
Tourist stop for the Tahquamenon Falls. The rust color is from the tannins in the cedar swamps along the river
Campsite night one. On Lake Superior with nobody in sight except cargo barges. Maybe my favorite place I've slept so far.
A forest fire burned this area back in 2012, with over 20,000 acres burned. The underbrush and some trees are recovering, and it was a great spot for wild blueberries.
Lake Superior barely seen on the horizon
Narrow trails. My buddy's third gen 4Runner fit down them much better
Tourist stop to Miner's Castle at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore
Miner's Falls
Miner's River
Tourist stop to the Log Slide where they used to slide timber into the water for transport
Probably not enough to cause rocker damage, but the sliders earned their place to keep the body panels out of the rocks
Heading south on our way home
