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Hunts' Guide to Michigan's UPPER PENINSULA
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JUST OUT!
A new edition of Hunts' Mapguide to Michigan's Upper Peninsula.
Over 300 entries, all conveniently located on maps and chosen because we think they are the coolest things to do in the U.P. (No ad tie-ins!) Great choices for restaurants, hikes, shops, adventures, museums, boat trips, waterfalls, vistas, road trips, and much more!
To learn more click UP MAP GUIDE
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L'ANSE
POINTS
OF
INTEREST
Baraga County Tourist & Recreation Association. Great weekday info center with local history books, terrific county map, savvy tips for exploring secluded area waterfalls, beaches, mountaintops, other backroad adventures. ...
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Falls River, Upper, Lower & Middle Falls. A wonderful, uncrowded place with complex waterfalls in a piney forest. One of the best U.P. waterfall walks, partly right in town. ...
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Front Street Park. Fine view of L'Anse Bay, fishing pier, marina, shipwreck, beach, playground and "train," summer concerts, picnic pavilion, horseshoes, waterfall trail. ...
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Indian Country Sports. Complete outdoors store (hunt, fish, canoe, kayak, camp, ski, snowshoe), info center, and working lighthouse. Lake trout tips from commercial fisherman's son. ...
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In the Mind's Eye. Regional gifts and art, art supplies, science and nature books for adults and children, one-hour photos — great for rainy days. ...
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Shrine of the Snowshoe Priest. A stature and shrine dedicated to the kindly priest in who in the 1830s ministered to the local Indians ...
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Powerhouse Falls
Hardly a mile south of L'Anse, this peaceful spot is a fine place to take a sandwich, sit, and enjoy the water rushing around you and the stone bluffs and trees across the Falls River. It's lovely in fall color season. This is not a fancy attraction.
The county tourism group has erected a simple shelter, but there's no toilet facility. The falls themselves are up behind the powerhouse, a peeling concrete block building. (An informal trail can take you back there.) A pleasant trail follows the river about a mile downstream. (—May, 2008)
From U.S. 41 a mile south of the turnoff into downtown L'Anse, turn west onto Power Dam Road at Reid's Funeral Home, an A-frame building. The little park is in ¾ mile. (906) 524-7444. No fee. Handicap access: gravel parking, flat terrain.
Little Mountain
Right outside L'Anse, this is one of those high places like Silver Mountain where a cap of resistant rock kept the hilltop from eroding away. A mostly quite gentle hike through woods ends up on a flat rock with a panoramic view of Keweenaw Bay and the Huron Mountains. Spectacular in fall! About 25 minutes up. (—May, 2008)
Off U.S. 41 about 2 miles south of L'Anse, or 9-10 miles north of M-28 junction near Covington. Take Golf Course Road 2 miles west to trailhead. Take left fork of trail if in doubt. (906) 524-7444. No fee. Not handicap accessible.
L'Anse Township Park & Campground. A serene bluff-top setting for park and modern campground, among pines and hemlocks overlooking Keweenaw Bay. Rocky beach is down below. ...
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Mount Arvon. In the Huron Mountains, Michigan's highest point has no view, but many take rugged logging roads to claim "I climbed Mount Arvon, Michigan's highest point." ...
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Shrine of the Snowshoe Priest
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High atop U.S. 41 and the red rock bluffs at the head of L'Anse and Keweenaw bays, a 35-foot-high bronzed statue is the centerpiece of a peaceful two-acre park. It pays homage to the Upper Peninsula's remarkable "Snowshoe Priest," Redemptorist Father Frederic Baraga. In 1830 he came to the American mission field from his native Slovenia, a small Slavic land on the Adriatic, east of Venice, Italy.
His kindness, good works for Native Americans, and long years spent as a missionary among native people won him widespread admiration among native and European Catholics here and in Slovenia, and among non-Catholics as well.
Father Baraga later became the first bishop of the Diocese of Marquette.
Trained for missionary work among Indians, Father Baraga came to the western Great Lakes to spread the Catholic faith among native people. He established five missions — including Grand Rapids, Michigan, of which he was a key founder.
His last mission, not far from here at Assinins north of Baraga, was the most challenging. It involved long winter travels as far as Eagle Harbor in the Keweenaw Peninsula. (Marquette TV 6 weatherman Karl Bohnak drew extensively on Father Baraga's diaries in his compelling book of Upper Peninsula weather history, So Cold a Sky.)
For more on Bishop Baraga's unusual life, see bishopbarabga.org/baraga and newadvent.org, the fascinating Catholic Encyclopedia from 1910 with some dated references.
The unusual memorial at the Shrine consists of the 35-foot statue perched on a little cloud supported by five leaping arches of laminated wood, one for each mission Baraga founded. He carries a 26-foot snowshoe and a cross. The sculpture stands in a little park with benches and a long view down Keweenaw Bay. It can be seen from afar on occasions when it is illuminated.
Votive candles near the shrine are protected from wind and rain. The statue is a cold depiction of a warm, deeply caring person. But when the likeness used for the statue was made, Baraga couldn't smile — he had had a stroke.
The Bishop Baraga Association, whose main purpose is working toward the canonization of Bishop Baraga, raised funds and erected the self-sustaining Shrine in the 1960s. Its land was given by the private property owners who developed the site and ran the little religious goods store and sometime pasty shop next to the parking lot.
The Shrine shop had been closed and for sale for awhile, until the winter of 2007-2008, when the vivacious young Sister Maria bought it. (Her tiny Catholic Store in Iron Mountain, on U.S. 2 on the west side, offers Catholic books and gifts, especially in demand for Christmas and in Holy Communion season.)
Today's Shrine offers similar Catholic books and gifts, plus baked goods, ice cream, coffee, and snacks— and singing around the campfire and other events.
Sister Maria is working to start a sisterhood, Missionaries of the Liturgy, but at the moment, she says, she is technically not a sister because no one else is in her group. Her site, missionariesoftheliturgy.com, explains more.
Buying the Shrine shop and its grounds is a leap of faith — "I know I'm buying a money pit," she has said. "I live by donations."
The road up to the shrine is on the south side of U.S. 41 a mile west of the turnoff to downtown L'Anse. The outdoor shrine is never closed. Free admission to shrine. Shop: (906) 524-7021. Shop open in summer Mon-Fri 11-5:30, Sat 11-3. Closed Sun. Spring and fall hours: Tues & Thurs 11-5:30, Sat 11-3. Call for winter hours. Wheelchair accessible with assistance. (—June, 2008)
Return to L'Anse
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