Pictured Rocks Cliffs: Why They're Striped Orange and Black
The stripes on the Pictured Rocks cliffs are mineral stain, still being laid down by groundwater leaking out of the sandstone. Iron makes the...
Land, water, weather, and the road there
Outdoors & Travel
Upper Peninsula wild places, practical travel context, outdoor traditions, and the stories behind the view.
U.P.-wide
15 stories from this part of the U.P.
U.P. Bear Season 2026: 5,103 Licenses, Same as 2025
The DNR called the 2026 quotas “similar.” They are identical, unit by unit, because bear quotas are set two years at a time. What...
After 111 Days of Deep Snow, DNR Watches U.P. Deer Herd
Michigan DNR says the 2025-26 U.P. winter exceeded its severe-winter threshold by 21 days. Biologists expect fewer deer, but no exact herd count was...
Chapel Rock: The Lone Pine Living on Thin Air
The lone pine on Chapel Rock at Pictured Rocks lives on a bare sandstone pillar, fed by roots stretched across open air since its...
Lake Sturgeon: Michigan's Living Dinosaur Fish
Seven feet long, older than the ice age, and still gliding along the bottom of the water you grew up on. There's a fish...
Yooperlites: How to Find Lake Superior's Glowing Rocks
They sat hidden on the beaches for a billion years before a Yooper with a flashlight figured them out Walk a Lake Superior beach...
The U.P. Has 750+ Wolves, Michigan's Only Wolf Population
Michigan's latest published winter estimate counted a minimum of 762 wolves in the U.P. in 2024., hunting in packs out in the cedar swamps...
Lake Superior Waves: The U.P.'s Inland Sea at Its Wildest
The biggest waves ever recorded on the Great Lakes rolled right past the U.P. — nearly three stories tall. Press play. Everyone outside the...
U.P. Waterfalls: 5 to See, Tahquamenon to Bond Falls
Michigan has over 300 named waterfalls, and the Lower Peninsula has exactly one of them Here is something that surprises a lot of people....
The Common Loon: The Sound of a U.P. Summer
The haunting call of the common loon is the sound of home to anyone who ever spent a summer up north Ask anyone who...
The Michigan Moose Lift: Moose Airlifted Into the U.P.
It took tranquilizer darts, slings, a 600-mile road trip, and 35-below cold, but the western U.P. has had moose ever since Here is a...
Isle Royale Wolves Hit 50-Year High as Moose Crash
The latest count from Isle Royale, the longest-running wolf and moose study on Earth, is one of the most dramatic in its 68 years...
Find a Fawn in Michigan? Here's What to Do (and Not Do)
It happens every June. You're out walking the property, or the kids spot something in the tall grass, and there it is — a...
Stories appear newest first and keep their original dates, corrections, and source records. Open the outdoors collection Corrections policy