Driving along the picturesque Lake Huron shore, you’ll encounter several slow-moving communities, including Rogers City, home to lovely lighthouses, parks, and beaches, and Alpena, a larger city favored by outdoor enthusiasts for its wildlife sanctuary and underwater preserve.

Despite its beautiful beaches, few travelers visit Rogers City, a quiet town of 3,300, better known as home to the world’s largest limestone quarry. The Huron shore’s limestone was formed by ancient seas that once covered most of the state. Full of coral-forming organisms, they eventually created large limestone deposits, one of which nears the earth’s surface in Rogers City.

In 1907, tests found that the limestone was unusually pure, ideal for making steel and many chemicals. The Michigan Limestone and Chemical Company was formed a year later, and subsequently purchased by U.S. Steel. Nearly four miles long and roughly three miles wide, the quarry is expected to produce well into the 21st century.

Alpena, protected by the deep curve of Thunder Bay, is the largest city north of Bay City on the Lake Huron shore, yet has always been tinged by a lack of respect. When surveyed in 1839, a deed to the land was offered to anyone in the survey party in lieu of summer wages, but few took the offer. At the time, the area was considered mostly a desolate cedar swamp.

Not long after, however, the intrepid Daniel Carter arrived with his wife and young daughter and built a log cabin, becoming the town’s first white settler. By 1857, a store and boardinghouse had popped up, and in 1859, Alpena became the site of the county’s first steam-powered sawmill. Before long, some 20 lumber and shingle mills buzzed life into the growing town.

Today, the town’s economy relies on a large cement industry. But for visitors, it also offers the chance to enjoy the natural beauty of the Great Lakes without the trendy development and gentrification that have taken over so many of the old resort towns on the opposite side of the state.

Part of the reason visitors have overlooked Alpena is because it’s not that easy to reach. More than 70 miles from the nearest interstate, it remains an unpretentious working-class town of corner bars and friendly residents. For decades, diversified industries, including paper mills, cement plants, and an Air Force base, meant that the area didn’t have to seek out the tourist trade the way other areas have.

But with its bread-and-butter industries gone, Alpena has learned to promote its assets. And there’s plenty worth promoting, including two lightly visited state parks with several miles of Lake Huron shoreline, a handsome marina, an impressive museum, northern Michigan’s only year-round professional theater, and a fascinating underwater preserve with more than 80 shipwrecks.

Getting There

Northwest offers commuter service to the Alpena County Regional Airport (APN) (1617 Airport Rd., Alpena, 989/354-2907, www.alpenaairport.com), and Greyhound (800/231-2222, www.greyhound.com) provides bus service to both Rogers City (409 N. Bradley) and Alpena (1235 State St.). But it’s probably easier (and cheaper) to reach this area via car. From I-75, take M-68 to Rogers City or M-32 to Alpena. Both towns can also be accessed via U.S. 23 along the coast.