Day 41 - St. Ignace to Ishpeming, MI

As Jim mentioned in the previous post, this stage of our trip is about exploration during the drive, vs. arriving somewhere to do the sightseeing.  We packed up the trailer in St. Ignace but before we hitched up, we drove across the highway to a lookout point called Castle Rock.  It was a hokey roadside attraction but we wanted to check it out anyway.  Basically there was an elaborate souvenir shop at the base and then we walked up 100+ stairs to a lookout point.  Great views of Lake Huron from up top, well worth all of the stairs! The proprietor of the shop was a super nice guy too so we were glad we went.

We took our time heading up to Ishpeming, stopping to have lunch along the shore of Lake Michigan.  We were surprised at how Michigan looks like an ocean with waves coming into the shore.  It was also much darker in color than Huron, which we thought looked like Caribbean water.

We stopping in Muinsing which was a very charming port city.  We had seen signs for a boat tour to see painted rocks so we decided to check it out.  We thought the boat ride would be about an hour so we put Faithy and Rio in the trailer and went for it.  Turns out it was a 2 1/2 hour trip!  Fortunately it was well worth it.  We saw beautiful rock formations and "paintings" courtesy of Mother Nature.  We were very pleased that we decided to stop and check this out.

We arrived in Ishpeming later that afternoon/evening and the RV park had very nice, spacious grass sites.  Since it was somewhat late, we decided to go out for dinner rather than cook. I checked Yelp for Mexican food (no luck...) so I decided to check for the highest rated restaurant in the area.  That turned out to be Congress Pizza so we decided to give it a try.  If any of you have been to this area, you've probably heard of Congress Pizza. It's a long-standing tradition in the area and it definitely lived up to it's reputation.  Delicious pizza!  They have a special recipe sausage called Cudighi, which Jim loved.  Very warm and friendly people in this area.  We got to put a pin for Beaverton on the map at Congress Pizza as well as the map at the campground:)

It's interesting that during a trip like this, being so far from home, we are more inclined to chat with total strangers and tell them about our trip.  I guess maybe it's the camping aspect of it, vs. staying in a hotel room...? 

This is a lighthouse on Lake Michigan:

These are pictures from our boat tour of the painted rocks: