Michigan has more lighthouses than any other state, well over 120 of them, and more than 40 of those stand watch right here in the U.P. They line the wild shores of three Great Lakes, and a lot of them are worth the drive.
Here are five of the most beautiful and storied, from the Shipwreck Coast in the east all the way out to the Keweenaw.
Start at Whitefish Point, near Paradise. First lit in 1849, it is one of the oldest lights still working on Lake Superior, and it sits on one of the most dangerous stretches of water in the Great Lakes. So many ships have gone down off this point that it earned a grim nickname: the Graveyard of the Great Lakes. The Edmund Fitzgerald sank not far from here, and today the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum shares the site with the old tower.
Not far down the shore, but a world away, sits Crisp Point. Reaching it means rattling down miles of narrow forest road, and that remoteness is the whole appeal. The 1903 tower stands alone on a lonely beach, and for years Lake Superior was slowly eating the ground out from under it. A group of volunteers stepped in, held back the erosion, and saved the lighthouse. You can still climb it today.
For the prettiest walk to a lighthouse anywhere, head to Au Sable Point, tucked inside Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. You have to earn this one, with a mile-and-a-half hike each way along the Lake Superior shore, but the views the whole way make it one of the most scenic lighthouse trips in the country.
Out on the Keweenaw, the Eagle Harbor Light has been guiding ships since 1871. With its red roof and its perch on the rocks above Lake Superior, it is about as classic a Great Lakes lighthouse as you will find, and the old keeper’s buildings now hold a museum packed with local shipwreck history.
Finally, the one you can drive right up to. The bright red Marquette Harbor Light has watched over the city since the 1850s, back when it guided freighters in to load up on all that iron and copper the U.P. was digging out of the ground. The local maritime museum runs tours, so you can actually go inside this one.
And that is just five. There are dozens more out there, some you can climb, and a few you can actually spend the night in, like the reputedly haunted Big Bay Point Light, now a bed and breakfast. So pick a stretch of shoreline and pack a windbreaker, because Lake Superior makes its own weather, and go find a few. They have stood watch up here for well over a century, and they are not done yet.
Sources: Pure Michigan, the U.P. Travel and Recreation Association, and the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum.
Featured image: Crisp Point Light by Notorious4life via Wikimedia Commons, CC0. Image enhanced/resized with Adobe.
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