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Lakes Tour Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | Day 8 | Day 9 | Draft Plan | Continue |
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In this trip we visited three national Parks : Cuyahoga Valley NP in Ohio, Isle Royale NP in Michigan
and Voyageurs in Minnesota. We have also seen four of the Great Lakes : Erie, Huron, Michigan and Superior.
We have never seen a lake as big as an ocean. We have never been to a place so primitive as Isle Royale either.
The trip was full of fun other than the extremely long drive.
The first half of the trip was for visiting these national parks. We have seen so many native animals such as a fox, a swimming black bear and countless bald eagles. The second half of the trip was full of culture and art. We visited a fresh water aquarium, a complex of buildings with museum like collections and so many architectures designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. It is an interesting and unique combination of nature and culture. We departed from our home at New Jersey. We spent a long time crossing Pennsylvania. Our first stop, Cuyahoga Valley NP, was not quite "scenic" in my opinion. Then we had a terribly long drive in Michigan. The scene on the way began to interest us once we hit the Mackinac Bridge which connects the north and south peninsulas of Michigan. | |||||||||
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This is the bridge. It is longer than Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and George Washington Bridge
in New York. They are very proud of it. The structure of the bridge does look beautiful. This is the
official web site of Mackinac Bridge.
Their slogan is "Embracing engineering and beauty".
You might want to consider our trip plan if you depart from New York City area by driving. Another interesting but crazy alternative is to go north to Niagara Falls then take I-90 west to pass Pennsylvania and reach Cleveland, Ohio. The benefits are that you can include Lake Ontario in the trip, plus a great falls, plus a couple Wright's building in Buffalo area. The cost is one extra day of driving. If you plan to go by plane, I suggest to make Chicago your destination then rent a car to go north to Copper Harbor. After that you can follow our trip plan then go back to Chicago. It will take probably 6 to 7 days but the driving time is much more reasonable than ours. You can fly to an airport close to Isle Royale (far, far away) or Voyageurs (International Falls, very close to Voyageurs) if you are only interested in national Parks. These two parks are about 5 to 6 hours drive and could be combined in the same trip. Forget about Cuyahoga Valley. | |||||||||
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