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GOD’S COUNTRY

U.P. named Best Destination for Fall Foliage by USA?TODAY

Fall colors at near maximum color are seen Sunday from Summit Peak at Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park. (photo courtesy of John Pepin)

IRON MOUNTAIN — The Upper Peninsula earned the top spot when USA Today announced its 10 Best Destinations for Fall Foliage.

“Our 384 miles of forests from Drummond Island to Ironwood will take your breath away,” said Tom Nemacheck, executive director of the Upper Peninsula Travel and Recreation Association, in a news release.

Early in September, USA Today’s 10Best local experts and editors posted online their 20 favorite destinations for fall color. They invited readers to vote for the top choice. Individuals could vote for their pick once each day for 28 days until noon Oct. 2.

The Upper Peninsula quickly jumped to the lead and surpassed the other top 10 vote-getters: Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri; the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania; Door County, Wisconsin; North Conway and the White Mountains in New Hampshire; Fayetteville and the Ozark Mountain Region in Arkansas; the Berkshires in Massachusetts; the Catskills in New York; the Black Hills and Badlands in South Dakota; and Taos, New Mexico.

Other contenders included Aspen, Colorado; Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park in Maine; Glacier National Park in Montana; and the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia.

Nemacheck said the U.P. is a natural destination for leaf peepers, with autumn’s warm days and cool nights transforming the deciduous trees into a technicolor landscape. The U.P. boasts that 85 percent of its 16,538 square miles are forested. Here travelers can catch the fall colors reflected in 4,300 inland lakes, 12,000 miles of streams and 1,700 miles of shoreline on lakes Superior, Michigan and Huron.

All but two of Michigan’s more than 200 waterfalls are in the U.P. as well. In addition to seeing the foliage, clear nights in October and November are also peak months in the U.P. to catch the swirling colors of the northern lights.

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