The Atlas Obscura Guide To Michigan

296 Cool, Hidden, and Unusual Things to Do in Michigan

Updated October 16, 2026

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Unusual Attractions in Michigan

Onsted, Michigan

Prehistoric Forest Amusement Park

The remains of an abandoned dinosaur theme park litter the woods just off the highway.

Manistique, Michigan

Kitch-iti-kipi

This freshwater spring fills with 10,000 gallons of water per minute.

Detroit, Michigan

John K. King Used & Rare Books

This sprawling bookstore spans four floors and has more than a million books in stock.

Detroit, Michigan

Grande Ballroom

Abandoned concert venue legendary for its rock counterculture.

Hell, Michigan

Hell on Earth is actually a small town in Michigan where anyone can be mayor for a day.

Detroit, Michigan

St. Agnes Church and School

Once a bastion of its community, this gothic cathedral now stands as a haunting ruin.

An aerial view of the lavender labyrinth

Shelby, Michigan

Cherry Point Farm and Market Lavender Labyrinth

A lavender labyrinth so large it’s visible on Google Earth.

See All 296 Things To Do in Michigan

Cool Places to Eat & Drink in Michigan

Port Huron, Michigan

The Raven Café

Located in a Civil War era building, this café is engrained with the spirit of Edgar Allen Poe.

Detroit, Michigan

The Raven Lounge

One of Detroit’s oldest blues clubs stands in defiance of the passage of time and the city’s shifting fortunes.

This Odawa-built building has some stories to tell.

Cross Village, Michigan

Legs Inn

Legs Inn provides Polish food, a cornucopia of Odawa artwork, wood carvings, and mounted deer heads.

See all 28 Places to Eat in Michigan

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Unforgettable Experiences Nearby

Atlas Obscura Itineraries

The Explorer’s Guide to Road Tripping Around the Great Lakes

While it might not be the first place that comes to mind when asked about bucket-list destinations, northern Michigan is no stranger to visitors. In-the-know “resorters”—as seasonal residents were called at the turn of the last century—have been flocking to this bucolic, rural region to escape the summertime heat of Chicago, Detroit, Cincinnati, Fort Wayne, and other Midwestern cities for generations. Part of the allure of any trip “Up North,” as the northern swath of Michigan’s lower peninsula is known, is to retreat to a bygone era long before cell phones and laptops—a time when the lakeside communities that sit near the 45th parallel halfway between the equator and the North Pole were mining for copper or iron, a time when those wealthy resorters arrived by steamship, train, or Model T. Just as those early travelers were escaping the heat, modern visitors deserve to escape hustle, and there is no better place to do so than certain iconic, nostalgia-steeped stops that remain suspended in time. That includes a fifth-generation fishing shanty where you can grab smoked whitefish to take home, the still-operating printing press of a beloved mid-century nature artist, and a lakeside cabin that’s served a Polish immigrant’s family recipes for 100 years.

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