Quote:
Originally Posted by GaryVoshol
I wish people would quit blindly quoting this. Even Google and Mapquest say it's 7.5 hours from Houghton to Traverse City. So unless you're traveling by broken-down school bus that can only reach 47 mph max or have a significant weather delay, this estimate has added at least 2 hours to the actual time needed. (And as anyone who has ever gone to MTU knows, you can go much faster than the speed limit through most of the UP. Not that I admit to ever doing that.  )
Travel for the UP teams (and for the second event for northern LP teams) is a significant factor. Let's just not make it more than it really is. |
Busses tend to drive the speed limit ;P And taking a bus does tack on a little additional time because you have to stop for food, bathroom breaks, etc. Most people can drive from Detroit to Mackinac City in 4.5-5 hours, but when I take a bus up there with scouts, it's about 6 hours because we have to stop for two meals.
On a side note, I learned yesterday that the distance between Detroit and Houghton is greater than the distance from Detroit to Washington DC...
My team's school district doesn't have school busses, and we are not a large team, so we carpool to events. We also try to do one "home" event and one "away" event each year. Being directly north of Detroit puts us within 2 hours of all of the MI events except Niles, West MI, and Traverse City. We get a hotel if we travel to one of those events. Kettering, Detroit, Livonia, Waterford, and States are close enough that a hotel would just be a waste of money. Since we always can get enough willing parents to drive (and students, for close events), renting a bus has never been considered as a viable option.