picture of bike leaning against an autumn tree, beer, smoked fish

Why go bicycle touring in the UP?

As you consider the Upper Peninsula as a bicycle touring location you'll learn more and more why the UP is really an ideal place to tour. As you look around this website, you'll get a better sense of the details. Here in brief are a few of the reasons why the UP is a great place for a bike trip:

  • The roads are good, but there's less traffic than more populated regions.
  • There are regularly spaced possibilities at a perfect 'bike tour' scale for interesting and useful stops (towns, roadhouses, water, roadside parks, forests, scenic spots, etc.)
  • Likewise, there regularly spaced lodging and camping locations so that there's always a good place at the end of the riding day (motels, campgrounds, camping areas).
  • The UP has regional variations that are also at an ideal scale for bicycle travel. A day's bicycle ride will take you to a different regional landscape at day's end from at day's start! In a ride of ~25-150 miles you can see differences in history, culture, food, economy, forests, climate, topography, lakes, and other features of the natural and cultural landscape. (to add - describe/link to story of tours as a day-by-day 'then I rode x road on day x and entered the neat little towns and farming region of the 'thin central' UP (Chatham, Eben, Trenary, et al.)
  • There's plenty of history to see reflecting the various activities of the UP! (museums, old town sites, old bridges and other infrastructure, abandoned motels & cabins, etc.)
  • The UP is centrally located for access from other regions of the US and Canada. There are regional airports in several areas of the UP, bus routes that can take you there too, and there are major hubs for both not far away.
  • The UP is inexpensive compared to more touristy regions! (road motels, for example, are about $35 to 60, and diners are likewise affordable.
  • The UP is incomparably beautiful! It's an area that is unique to the world because of its remote location; glacial landscape; and climatic influence from three Great Lakes, yet not spoiled by overdevelopment and tourism sprawl like too many others
  • The Upper Peninsula is suitable for various types of bicycling - self-contained camping; 'credit card' motelling; guided, supported, or group tours; off-road touring on old RR grades of logging roads; thematic tours based on history, natural history, fishing, Great Lakes, cultural; - or a combination of types!
  • Three (or four if you're a winter biker!) proper seasons that are equally beautiful, but each with a very different 'feel' (fall colours, summer tourist businesses, seasonal motel rates, low spring and fall traffic, etc.)
  • The UP is an ideal segment for cross-continent travellers. For Canadian cross-country routes it allows a nice US-side diversion for a change of culture; for US travellers a it's good alternative to more congested southern routes as well as being the eastern end of the very fine US 2 route that follows the northern states to the West.
  • There are friendly people who are proud of their land.