Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park

Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park, photo by kmaz.

Be sure to check this out bigger or in Konrad’s Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park set (slideshow).

I’m thinking this waterfall might be Manabezho Falls. For more on this amazing state park, check out Porcupine Mounties on Michigan in Pictures, this cool article from Summit Post on visiting and enjoying the Porkies and the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park site.

More of the same (and much more of the different) in the Michigan Waterfalls group on Flickr!

Swan Origami

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Swan Oragamy

Swan Oragamy, photo by MudPhish.

…it’s apparently all the rage these days.

Be sure to check it out bigger.

Hungarian Falls on the Keweenaw Peninsula

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Hungarian Falls - Middle

Hungarian Falls – Middle, photo by dcclark.

David writes that this is the middle drop of Hungarian Falls near Tamarack City on the Keweenaw Peninsula. He says that the falls are never running this well, except at just the right point during the spring melt. The Keweenaw CVB page on Hungarian Falls has directions to the falls and says:

The Upper Hungarian Falls, about 10 feet wide, is located in a beautiful hardwood forest, and drops about 25 feet over a wall of red stone. Downstream the Hungarian Creek slides over the Hungarian Dam to create an unnamed 5-foot falls just below on the far side of the river whose rock walls and ledge appear almost handmade. About 100 yards downstream is a second unnamed falls of about 7 feet into a small pool. Another 250 feet downstream a third unnamed falls drops 25 feet in a shaded canyon whose moss covered walls extend from both sides of the falls. 400 feet downstream is the Lower Hungarian Falls, the most spectacular of all the falls, that drops another 15 feet over terraced rock.

Here’s the location of Hungarian Falls on Waymarking and Upper & Lower Hungarian Falls from Hunts Guide to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.

You can see this photo larger in David’s Spring slideshow. He has another photo of Hungarian Falls in winter. Check out David’s blog Cliffs and Ruins for more photos and stories.

Into the light

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Into the light

Into the light, photo by keren8484.

You must be strong now. You must never give up. And when people make you cry and you are afraid of the dark, don’t forget the light is always there.

All I would add is that you remember that rain is our down payment on flowers & green.

River Raisin Flood in Dundee

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Untitled, photo by bohemianrobot.

March means more sun, warmer temps and melting snow. All are pretty welcome, but after a winter with as much snow as we’ve had, they also bring a risk of flood. We do better job of controlling the waters now than we did in March of 1908, but we still see rivers top their banks.

The US Geologic Survey’s Michigan Flood Watch has flood resources for Michigan including this nifty map showing currently flooded rivers and those at risk.

See this photo of the Dundee Mill bigger right here. You can check out more shots of the flooded River Raisin in bohemianrobot’s flood slideshow and in from other Flickr members and see other Michigan flood photos in the Absolute Michigan pool on Flickr.

Stay dry!

Sometimes Michigan’s great

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

see sometimes michigans great

see sometimes michigans great, photo by iwywhjtm.

As we prepare for another bout of winter, I thought it might be nice to have a little reminder that any state where you get to wear t-shirts and shorts in the middle of winter and still HAVE winter is pretty darn cool.

(note – don’t try this today!)

Fly over to the Grand Rapids Boat Show

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

1 passenger

1 passenger, photo by joojanta.

Over on Absolute Michigan we’re giving away some tickets to the Grand Rapids Boat Show (Feb 18-22). There’s about 100 boat manufacturers, all kinds of special demos and such so if you’re a boating fan, you might want to enter the giveaway, check out a slideshow from years past on Flickr and the Absolute Michigan “boat” (slide)show!

I doubt they’ll have boats like the one above though, but you never know. joojanta has other views of this crazy contraption here and here.

Return to the Eben Ice Caves

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

icecave

icecave, photo by johndecember.

A lot of folks have been coming by this month looking for pictures of the Eben Ice Caves in the UP’s Alger County (also known as the Rock River Canyon Ice Caves). Check out John’s Eben Ice Caves slideshow for a whole bunch of cool photos!

You can learn a lot more about this cool wintertime phenomenon at The Eben Ice Caves on Michigan in Pictures.

Detroit Journal – Words and Pictures by buckshot.jones

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

gray

gray, photo by buckshot.jones.

Scott aka buckshot.jones has a tremendous set of photos titled Detroit Journal – Words and Pictures. Some are funny, some revisit the past and many more take a hard look at the state of the city.

If you love Detroit or simply wonder what happened and is happening in the city, I cannot recommend this collection highly enough. Here are the words that go with the photo above:

I’d look into the mirror every morning only to find the same guy staring back. Then, it seems suddenly, I find some 50 year old grump is staring back. Who is this guy? The changes happen so slowly with such steady force I failed to see the changes. I noticed the laugh lines around my eyes are now stubbornly etched into my face even in times of scorn. As I contemplate these changes I think of friends and family and how, in my mind’s eye, they are still 21, bolted down in time. Just like me, or so I thought. Now consider that old friend you haven’t seen in 10 or 15 years. Think of how you had to do a double take when you met after all those years. The face is familiar but the changes make you not quite sure. You hesitantly state their name with a question, “John?”

For me my home town is curiously like encountering that long lost friend. I have lived here my entire life yet over the last couple years the changes in Detroit have, at times, struck me as startling. For most of my early life, as a schoolboy and a young adult, I spent my time working throughout the city neighborhoods and business districts. During all that time these neighborhoods were in decline, I just never noticed the change. About 10 years ago I took a job that had me traveling a great deal in Canada and since that time my professional life has found me spending most of my time away from home traveling all over the Midwest.

As my body banned me from playing basketball and my lack of patience killed my golf game, photography filled the distraction void. Trading the links for a photo safari on my weekends, I started to wander around my old haunts mostly in search of connections to my memories. I was struck by what I found, or in some instances failed to find- my home town suddenly got old. “Detroit….right?”

Sturgeon Falls on the West Branch of the Sturgeon River

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Falls on the West Branch of the Sturgeon River

Falls on the West Branch of the Sturgeon River, photo by Treefarmer.

This photo is part of Treefarmer’s Waterfall set (slideshow). Not all are from Michigan, so if you’re feeling exclusive, you can see it in his Upper Peninsula of Michigan set.

Go Waterfalling’s page on Sturgeon Falls says:

Sturgeon Falls is located in the Sturgeon River Gorge Wilderness in Ottawa National Forest. The Sturgeon River has carved out a deep, forested gorge, that is 300 feet deep in some places. The falls are located deep in the gorge. The drop is only 30 feet, but the river is very powerful. Above the falls the river is well over 100 feet wide. It then narrows into a chute only about 30 feet wide before shooting over the falls, spraying mist in all directions.

The Go Waterfalling page has detailed directions and some cool movies. They add that that Canyon Falls (also on the Sturgeon River) are much easier to reach.

Should you want to reach them though, here’s Sturgeon Falls on the Absolute Michigan Map of Michigan.