Northern Michigan Road Trip: Leland to Mackinac Island

Northern Michigan is the rare American road trip where the water steals the show from the road. For roughly 150 miles, the route from Traverse City up through the Leelanau Peninsula and on to the Straits of Mackinac hugs a coastline of Caribbean-blue bays, 400-foot sand bluffs, cherry orchards, and harbor towns that still smoke their own whitefish. Give it four to six days. The classic window is late June through Labor Day, but locals will tell you September is the sweet spot: Lake Michigan is at its warmest, the cherry and wine harvests are in, the light turns gold, and the summer crowds have gone home. Fly into Cherry Capital Airport (TVC) or drive up — either way, you'll want a car until the very last stop, where cars are famously banned.

Start with two nights in Traverse City. The self-proclaimed Cherry Capital of the World earns the title every July when the National Cherry Festival takes over the bayfront, but the town's real draw now is its food. Book ahead — well ahead — for The Cooks' House, the tiny Wellington Street restaurant where chefs Eric Patterson and Jennifer Blakeslee have been turning Leelanau farm produce into some of the Midwest's best tasting menus since 2008. For dessert, do what Traverse City families do and drive ten minutes west to Moomers Homemade Ice Cream on Long Lake Road, an ice cream shop attached to a working dairy farm — you can watch the herd that produced your scoop graze while you eat it on the porch. Then spend a slow afternoon driving the 18-mile spine of the Old Mission Peninsula, a ridge of vineyards and cherry orchards splitting Grand Traverse Bay in two, ending at the 1870 Mission Point Lighthouse, which sits almost exactly on the 45th parallel — halfway between the equator and the North Pole.

Follow M-22 to Leland and give Fishtown an hour it deserves. The west side of the Leelanau Peninsula is threaded by M-22, a road so beloved its route markers keep getting stolen, and its best stop is Leland's Fishtown — a huddle of weathered gray fishing shanties along the Leland River that has worked as a commercial fishing dock since the 1800s. Two of the shanties matter most. Carlson's Fishery, run by the fifth generation of the same family, smokes whitefish right on the dock; get the smoked whitefish pâté. Two doors down, the Village Cheese Shanty stacks house sandwiches on pretzel bread that draw a line out the door every summer noon. The local move is to combine them: pâté from Carlson's, a Leelanau sandwich from the Cheese Shanty, and a seat on the dock watching the charter boats come through the channel. Leland is also the ferry port for the Manitou Islands if you want a wilder day out.

Sleeping Bear Dunes is the headliner — climb it, but don't stop there. The national lakeshore's famous Dune Climb is exactly as advertised: a 200-foot wall of sand children sprint up and adults regret halfway. Do it, then drive the Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive, where the Lake Michigan Overlook puts you on a bluff 450 feet above the water — the view that helped the park win Good Morning America's 'Most Beautiful Place in America.' Then skip the crowds for the two overlooks locals actually use. The Empire Bluff Trail, just south of Empire village, is a 1.5-mile round trip through beech forest that ends on a boardwalk hanging over the lake — the best sunset spot in Leelanau County. And up at the peninsula's northern tip, the Pyramid Point trail climbs about a mile to a grassy bowl rim where hang gliders launch and the Manitou Islands float offshore. One warning that bears repeating: don't run down the bluffs to the water. The climb back up is brutal, and rescues are a regular (and billable) event.

Then drive north to the Straits. It's about two hours from Leelanau to Mackinaw City, where ferries — Shepler's and the Mackinac Island Ferry Company, from both Mackinaw City and St. Ignace — make the crossing to Mackinac Island in around 20 minutes. Leave the car in the mainland lot; it can't come. Mackinac banned automobiles in 1898 and never looked back, so everything on the island moves by horse-drawn carriage, bicycle, or foot, and the loudest sound downtown is hooves on pavement.

On Mackinac, the trick is to out-bike the day-trippers. Rent a bike near the dock and ride M-185 — at 8.2 miles, the only state highway in America where cars are banned — around the island's rim; the whole loop takes about an hour with stops, and the crowds thin out within the first half mile. Detour up to Arch Rock, a limestone arch standing 146 feet above turquoise Lake Huron, and give Fort Mackinac an hour for its 1780 ramparts, cannon firings, and the best bird's-eye view of the harbor. Instead of queuing for lunch on Main Street, stock a picnic at Doud's Market, the family grocery that has been serving the island since 1884 — the oldest family-owned grocery store in America — and eat it on the fort's lawn or at British Landing halfway around the loop. The fudge shops are mandatory anyway; a half-pound gets you through the ferry ride home.

Practical notes: base yourself in Traverse City for two or three nights, then either day-trip Mackinac or — better — spend one night on the island. The evenings are the secret: once the last ferry leaves around dinnertime, the island reverts to its 500-odd residents, the streets empty, and a porch chair at sunset feels like a different century. If your budget stretches, that porch might as well be the Grand Hotel's — at 660 feet, the world's longest. Book island lodging and The Cooks' House weeks ahead in summer. June brings the Lilac Festival to Mackinac and cool dune hikes to Leelanau; color-chasers should aim for the first two weeks of October, when M-22 and the Pierce Stocking drive turn into tunnels of red and orange.