AU TRAIN

Region: Pictured Rocks/Munising/Au Train

Located just south of where the Au Train River finally makes its sandy, serpentine connection with Lake Superior, Au Train has long been a summer resort. The settlement goes back to 1856. It's centered on the Au Train-Forest Lake Road that runs south from M-28 at Au Train Bay. The area has become popular with retirees. The year-round township population is 1,138, but it swells in summertime. The local information hub is the AU TRAIN GROCERY (906-892-8142), which is also a gas station, general store, busy pasty, sub shop & deli, liquor store, and motel, open year-round. Its pasties have a big reputation. Its five motel rooms are simple, clean, and convenient, within walking distance to the beach.

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The grocery is on H-03 a few blocks south of the M-28 blinker light. Across the street, the AU TRAIN CAFÉ (906-892-8131) is a small sit-down restaurant with a varied menu.
The sand beach here along Lake Superior extends for miles and offers beautiful views across the bay. Scenic highway turnouts make it easy to get out and walk the beach. The preferred swimming spot is the warmer Au Train River by the highway bridge, just before it enters the lake. It connects with AU TRAIN LAKE, south of the village. At 830 acres, it's is an all-sports lake known for walleye and large northern pike. (For boat, canoe rentals, see Au Train River canoe trail below.)

"Au Train" is one of many Upper Peninsula names that comes from 18th-century voyageurs canoeing Lake Superior's shores. According to Walter Romig in Michigan Place Names: "The river carried so much sand into the lake here as to form a shoal, over which the voyageurs would drag (trainerant, in French) their canoes to make a short cut."

This site was also popular with Ojibwe, who camped here while they hunted and fished nearby. They used the river to begin yearly treks south to Lake Michigan over the Bay de Noc Trail, still maintained for hikers and horses by the Hiawatha National Forest. Later Au Train became a dog-team stop on the northern Upper Peninsula mail route.

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PLACES AROUND AU TRAIN TO

Eat Sleep Camp