U.P. Makes ShermansTravel Top 10 Summer Vacation List

Suffering from Capri ennui? Finding the Hamptons just the tiniest bit tedious? Well then, check out a lesser known vacation paradise: the U.P.

Yah, you betcha, Michigan's Upper Peninsula has made the Top 10 Summer Destinations list. True, ShermansTravel ranked us 10th, but in company such as all the National Parks and Scandinavia (four whole countries), we aren't complaining.

Allison Carter, Michigan Tech's director of undergraduate recruitment, was pleased, to say the least.

"I thought, wow. How cool is that? We're on the same scale as the Greek Isles."

The Top 10 article, available on the MSN Travel site at http://travel.msn.com/Guides/article.aspx?cp-documentid=345882&GT1=802 , describes the U.P. as a land "where majestic wildlife, unspoiled rivers, waterfalls and dense forests abound."

Well, duh, ShermansTravel. Tell us something we don't know. In all fairness, however, the U.P. is famous--if it is famous at all--as a remote, wilderness paradise of snow and ice. It's easy to forget that even the north country has a spring thaw.

"Summer in the U.P. is amazingly beautiful," Carter said. "We've got Lake Superior, waterfalls, lots of history and tons of outdoor recreation."

"Usually, students who come Michigan Tech know about our great winters, but they are really surprised at how beautiful it is here in the summer, and about how many neat things they can do," she said. "In addition to all the recreation, there's a lot going on in the local communities."

Already booked your summer vacation? Then you might want to pencil in the U.P. for your fall color tour or winter getaway. True, we don't have the nightlife of Top 10 Summer Destination No. 4, London. But the snowmobiling is a heck of a lot better.

Michigan Technological University is a public research university founded in 1885 in Houghton, Michigan, and is home to more than 7,000 students from 55 countries around the world. Consistently ranked among the best universities in the country for return on investment, Michigan’s flagship technological university offers more than 120 undergraduate and graduate degree programs in science and technology, engineering, computing, forestry, business and economics, health professions, humanities, mathematics, social sciences, and the arts. The rural campus is situated just miles from Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, offering year-round opportunities for outdoor adventure.