It’s true that the south does not have the snow and sometimes-brutal cold of the upper midwest, but the south also does not have the colors of autumn. Though a lot of last week’s trip to Michigan’s northern Lower Peninsula was overcast, there was no missing the seasonal change.
Dawn and I stayed off the highways and stuck to the two-lane state roads, traveling north along the west side of the Lower Peninsula near Lake Michigan, and then south on the east side along the edge of Lake Huron. Some miscellaneous observations:
-
We saw only two Confederate flags the entire while. Similarly, there is nowhere the density of churches in rural northern Michigan as in rural North Carolina. In other words, there are a lot fewer backward-looking reactionaries up there.
-
Michigan has done a lousy job of protecting public access to the Great Lakes. Lake Michigan is practically unapproachable, and Lake Huron is easily accessed in only the northernmost quarter of its shoreline.
Lake Superior is easily accessed everywhere. I don’t know, though, if that is because the winters are so miserable in the Upper Peninsula that there is a lot less development, or if the National Lakeshore designation prevents development.
-
In spite of the gabble about “southern hospitality,” midwesterners are far more direct, open, and friendly than southerners. It is a different culture, and healthier.