Michigan Fall Foliage 2026

Keweenaw Peninsula · 1,335 ft · peaks Sep 27

Nine miles of ridge road running 700 feet above Lake Superior, with pullouts facing open water one direction and a bowl of maple forest and inland lakes the other. The summit lot gives you both compositions without moving the car.

Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park · 1,378 ft · peaks Sep 28

The escarpment drops 300 feet to a narrow lake wedged in the Big Carp River valley, with unbroken hardwood ridges running east to the horizon. Morning fog sits on the water and burns off from the far end first, so the layers separate.

Black River National Scenic Byway · 844 ft · peaks Sep 30

The Black River spreads 30 feet wide over a conglomerate shelf and drops into a hemlock-shaded chute, with maple leaves collecting in the pools below. Five waterfalls sit within four miles of byway, so one stop rarely ends the day.

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore · 672 ft · peaks Oct 1

A sandstone turret juts off the cliff line into turquoise shallows, with maple and birch crowding the rim behind it and Grand Island across the water. It is the only Pictured Rocks cliff you can shoot from above without a boat.

Tahquamenon Falls State Park · 670 ft · peaks Oct 1

A 200-foot-wide curtain of tannin-stained amber water drops 50 feet into a gorge walled with maple and hemlock. The gorge overlook puts the falls upstream and slightly below you, so the color wraps both sides of the frame.

Tunnel of Trees Heritage Route · 699 ft · peaks Oct 4

Twenty miles of one-lane blacktop with no shoulder and maple limbs closing overhead, Lake Michigan flashing through the trees on the west side. Flat light keeps the canopy saturated instead of blowing out the gaps.