Here’s How Long it Takes to Travel the Length of Michigan by Ship

If you've travelled Michigan crisscross, you've likely got a good feeling about how long it would take to get from one side of the state to the other. Or likely to our great bottleneck point, the Mackinac Bridge. But how long would it take if you were in a shipping vessel and you were sailing in Michigan's waters?

It's an interesting and eye-opening question. How long would you have to sail to reach key destinations from the Soo Locks in Sault Ste. Marie at the very tip of Michigan?

Michigan Film Photographer Karl Wertanen snapped an image at the Soo Locks that shows travel times in both miles and hours from the locks in sailing time and distance.

The nearest location from the locks is the Mackinac Bridge. It'd be about an hour in highway time along I-75, but it's a different matter by ship. A freighter would need to navigate the St Mary's River to the open waters of Lake Huron. Unlike the short car trip thought the Eastern Upper Peninsula (EUP), the sea voyage to go 90 miles would take 7 hours.

Staying in Lake Superior, it's 11 hours to Marquette, 15 hours to the tip of the Keweenaw at Copper Harbor and 28 hours to the other end of the lake at Duluth.

MORE TO SEE: 24 Bridges to Enter the Upper Peninsula of Michigan that Aren't the Mackinac Bridge

Swinging a hard right at the straits of Mackinac into Lake Michigan, sailing from the Soo Locks and you'll hit Green Bay in 18 hours and Chicago in 29 hours.

Heading south through Lake Huron, you can make Detroit 24 hours.

Pass though Lake Erie to Lake Ontario, you'd hit Toronto in 52 hours then though the St. Lawrence, it'd be Quebec City in 84 hours.

If you traveled as far as the open ocean and a trans-Atlantic voyage, a shipping vessel from Sault Ste Marie would hit Casablanca, Morocco in Africa in 13 and a half days.

These time are, of course, estimates based on a steady, set speed and fair weather conditions.