On Tour
in ATV Country

by Bill Wood

Welcome to the Republic of the Upper Peninsula.”

OK, the sign doesn’t really say that. What it says is: “Mackinac Bridge Ahead.” But it means pretty much the same thing, because when you cross the bridge connecting Michigan’s Lower Peninsula to the U.P., you fully expect to see a uniformed customs agent with an accent demanding to see your passport.

The rules are all reversed from that country to the south where the rest of us live. Down there, you find thousands of miles of paved roads and highways, and only a handful of places where you can ride an off-road bike or ATV. Up here, there are relatively few paved roads, and thousands of miles of dirt roads and trails open to bikes, ATVs and snowmobiles. 

Down there, when you talk about touring, you’re talking big motorcycles with saddlebags. Up here, you can actually tour on an ATV.

No kidding. It is entirely possible to travel from town to town, filling up at gas stations, eating in restaurants and staying in motels, without ever loading your ATV onto a trailer. In fact, the basic rule is, “You can get there from here.”

Grant and I learn this from Marc Pickelman of Pickelman’s Performance in Newberry, Michigan, which is in the heart of the eastern U.P.’s recreation area (see “48 Places to Get Riding,” page 39). Marc has a couple of brand-new Polaris Sportsman 600 twins waiting for us as we arrive at his shop on a Wednesday morning, ready for a day of ATV riding.

Our first question is the same one asked by visiting ATV riders all over the country: “So where can we ride?”

But the answer catches us off-guard. “You can go pretty much anywhere you want,” Marc says.

He explains that there’s an enormous network of snowmobile and motorcycle trails in the area. But in case that’s not enough, all forest roads within the huge Lake Superior State Forest are open to ATVs, as are many of the county roads in Luce County. All you need to do is stay all the way to the right and keep your speed to 25 mph.

Sorry, we’re from the United States. We don’t understand.

So he shows us, leading the way to a forest road that also serves as part of the connector system for a major snowmobile trail. It’s not just open to off-highway vehicles, it’s marked better than many state highway systems. There are arrows pointing back toward gas and food in Newberry, arrows pointing ahead toward more of the same in Rexton, and even signs showing distances to various destinations. 

From there, we strike out on our own, exploring a variety of the available routes, from gravel roads to pillow-soft sandy trails. And it quickly becomes obvious that there’s an entire off-highway transportation system up here. 

The snowmobile trails are the interstates of this unpaved network. In the places where the ATV/off-road bike routes coincide with the snowmobile trails, you find plenty of directional signs, plus warnings of approaching road crossings and even markers showing curves ahead. On the other hand, the twisty back roads of this system are the motorcycle trails, which range from tight to tighter to tightest.

Somewhere in that mix, you can find something that suits your vehicle and your riding ability.

Our route takes us to the outskirts of the small town of Rexton, where we come out right next to a gas station. It seems like cheating to be able to ride right up to a gas pump and fill up an ATV, but our arrival doesn’t even draw a second glance from the woman running the station. She tells us she gets a fair number of customers on ATVs through the warm months.

“But it’s nothing like the snowmobilers in the winter,” she says. “They’re big all week and bigger on weekends. I’ve had people stop in who’ve ridden their snowmobiles all the way from Minnesota.”

That’s a trip across three states and nearly 400 miles. On a vehicle without a license plate. And it’s legal!

From Rexton, we continue southeast, toward the northern tip of Lake Michigan. We hit a section of deep sand that’s big fun on an ATV, particularly a powerful 600cc twin like the Sportsman. In four-wheel-drive mode, the Sportsman will happily crawl along at walking speed. But build up enough momentum, and you can climb up on top of the loose surface. It feels like you’re piloting a hovercraft, skimming smoothly over water. 

In other places, the trail is a tree-shaded lane that leads past hidden lakes and marshes. The view is great, but when we park the machines and take a few steps off the trail for a closer look, we discover that the dry, powdery surface quickly gives way to something with the consistency of quicksand. It should serve as a warning, but of course, it doesn’t.

Eventually, we arrive in the tiny community of Epoufette, right on the lake. And there, overlooking the water, is a small restaurant. 
We pull into the lot and park unobtrusively behind a pickup truck. We can’t help it. We’re still sure that at any moment, someone’s going to come along and “hey, hey” us right out of here. Instead, we walk through the front door, and the owner says, “How you doin’? Sit anywhere you like.”

Lunch on an ATV ride is usually trail mix and granola bars, washed down with water from your hydration pack. Instead, we feast on $4 sandwiches and a million-dollar view. 

The route out of town loops north on a logging road, taking us into deep forest. Approaching Carp Lake, we turn west, aiming for Rexton and, beyond that, Newberry. 

The route we take starts out as a gravel road, and on the map, anyway, it connects to the trail system we rode this morning. As we continue, though, the “road” gets narrower, and considerably less road-like. Eventually, the trail appears to end right at a railroad track. On the other side is a tight trail that seems to head south. But on our side of the tracks, there’s clearly a route marker pointing west, the way we want to go. So we take that option.

In retrospect, this is not the best decision we’ve ever made. But we failed to consider two important facts: One, some of these trails are snowmobile-only routes. And two, snowmobiles operate in winter, when the ground is frozen.

Grant, who is leading the way, goes probably 150 feet before he hits one of those boggy areas like the ones we’d discovered on foot earlier. 

Now, the Polaris Sportsman 600 is one remarkably capable four-wheel-drive ATV. But Grant is an even more-capable quicksand-finder. Instantly, the Polaris sinks to the tops of its wheels. It’s a struggle for Grant just to get off the thing and make his way back to solid ground. Great.

We push and pull, succeeding only in getting ourselves completely covered in muck, and the ATV even more firmly buried. Clearly, this is going to require more equipment than we have on hand.

Checking the map, I see that the town of Trout Lake is about seven miles away, and it appears I can reach it on legal county roads. I head off, leaving Grant with a cellphone, some water and those granola bars we didn’t eat at lunch—just in case.

A woman at a gas station in Trout City searches through the entire building, plus two pickup truck beds, and comes up with about 50 feet of chain. When I get back to the scene, Grant has dug out as much of the muck as he can from the wheels. We connect the machines, put them in four-wheel-drive low, and slowly pull. Making a giant sucking sound worthy of a Ross Perot speech, the Sportsman emerges from the goo. 

Suddenly, it’s a beautiful day again.

We return the chains in Trout Lake, then head back. It’s sunset when we reach Pickelman’s, and my tripmeter has recorded nearly 125 miles in a single day. I can’t remember doing that on any two days of ATV riding anywhere else. 

Fortunately, the sight of two thoroughly filthy ATVs doesn’t faze Marc at all.

“Looks like you had fun,” he says.

Yeah, Marc, lots of it—exploring the Republic of the Upper Peninsula. And we didn’t even need passports.

© 2003, American Motorcyclist Association