Timm’s Hill and Mount Arvon (Highpoints #2 &3)

On a nice September weekend, a friend of mine and I set out to reach the high points of Wisconsin (Timm’s Hill) and Michigan (Mt. Arvon). Our motivation was high for such low summits. The elevation of Timm's hill is 1951 feet, and Mount Arvon's is 1979 feet. Regardless, it was nice to reach two highpoints in one day.

We woke up early so that we could get to both of these high points on the same day. Since they are a few hours apart, and we absolutely wanted daylight while we were in Michigan (crucial due to the sketchiness of the roads leading up to the summit).

Once we parked in Timm’s Hill county park, just outside of Ogema, it was only ¼ mile uphill to the summit. Before making the long trek up, we looked at the sign-in log. Someone who was there earlier than us signed “Highpoint #14”. This sounded like a good idea to us, as we signed “Highpoint #2”.

After a short walk up a trail, we were at the summit, where we saw two lookouts. One of them is a nice wooden structure with stairs, and goes up about 45 feet. The other structure is an old metal lookout tower that happens to be about 20 feet taller, but the only way up is to climb a metal ladder. While I wouldn’t quite say this is extreme, it was probably the most dangerous thing we did all day. The worst part was while on the ladder worrying about your hands slipping (see picture). From the top of the metal tower, there was a nice view of a nearby lake and woods. Nothing too spectacular, but it was pleasant.

From Ogema, we made our way north through Wisconsin. Along the way there are several “Cabin towns”, where many people were enjoy weekends in the summer, but fewer people live during the rest of the year. We stopped to eat in one of them, and eventually crossed the border into Upper Michigan.

We entered L’Anse Michigan, and took a road to go east of town, and once we saw a church outside of town, took a right onto a gravel road that had signs pointing us toward the summit of Mt. Arvon. This gravel road continued, going over a small bridge with the sign “Hundred Dollar Bridge” and wound through the woods. Fortunately, there were occasional signs pointing us in the right direction. This road became somewhat rough, and was fun to drive on with the constant bumps.

We arrived at a spot with a couple of large rocks blocking the road, and we saw a truck parked there. We knew we were close to the summit. We started to walk up a trail and sure enough, there was a sign and a bench marking the summit. We chatted with a few people who were up there, one of them a boy scout earning a badge. They pointed us in the direction of a scenic overlook, which was nice, though it was somewhat blocked by trees. We could see Lake Superior, though, which was a nice bonus. One interesting thing about Mount Arvon is that it wasn’t considered Michigan’s highest point until quite recently, as there is a nearby hill, Mount Curwood, that is about a foot lower that was long considered the high point.

It was late afternoon by the time we left Mount Arvon, and took a quick break in L’Anse to check out the Lake Superior waterfront. There wasn’t a lot going on in the town, but we took the time to learn a little more about the area and then moved on.

The views weren’t amazing, and we spent much more time in the car than we did on any hiking trails, but we accomplished our goal of reaching the highpoints of Wisconsin and Michigan in the same day.