The Duluth North Pier Lighthouse (Photo by Matthew James)

On Nov. 10, 1975 — 49 years ago next week — the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a Lake Superior Storm, killing all 29 crew members on board. As noted in Gordon Lightfoot’s ballad, “The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald,” the ship sank during a November gale, a Great Lakes weather event in which Artic air from the north collides with Gulf air from the south, creating hurricane-level winds. With the Lake Superior Marine Museum’s Gales of November event approaching, this post takes a look at the lighthouses that historically guided Great Lakes ships to safety during these storms. It concludes with a Geoguessr that includes Lake Superior lighthouses in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ontario.

The Lake Superior Circle Tour guide lists 56 lighthouses that still remain along the waters of Lake Superior (or near the waters of Lake Superior, as one lighthouse that appears in the Geoguessr challenge was moved after closing to become an attraction for a now closed restaurant). When I think of lighthouses on the greatest of the Great Lakes, Split Rock Lighthouse, towering a top of a large cliff on the shoreline, immediately comes to mind. Nearly half of Lake Superior’s lighthouses, however, aren’t along the coast of Lake Superior at all, however, but scattered among the 400 islands within Lake Superior. These lighthouses, accessible only by boat, don’t appear on Google Streetview imagery, but at least one — featured in the Geoguessr game — can be seen through Google Boatview imagery.

A 1905 November gale that destroyed almost 30 ships led to the construction of Split Rock Lighthouse, now one of the most photographed locations in Minnesota (Photo by Matthew James)

Although most of the lighthouses on Lake Superior were decommissioned some time ago, several are still in operation. Grand Marais, Michigan, has two lighthouses that have been in continuous operation since 1895. Minnesota’s oldest lighthouse in continuous operation, built in 1892, can be found in nearby Two Harbors (more recently, it also functions as a bed and breakfast).

With potentially stormy November weather ahead and the guitar Gordon Lightfoot used to write “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” currently up for auction, this Geoguessr challenge looks at lighthouses in the three states and one Canadian province that make up the shoreline of the world’s largest named freshwater lake by surface area.

PDD Geoguessr #29: Lake Superior Lighthouses

How to Play Geoguessr

GeoGuessr can be played on a laptop or desktop and on Android or IoS mobile devices with the GeoGuessr app. Just click on the link that fits how you play. You can create an account to keep track of your scores and see how you compare to other players or just click on the link above to play as a guest without having to create an account or log in.

Every game consists of five locations based on a theme chosen by the game creator. You are shown a Streetview image stripped of all the informational labels that are normally overlayed onto the image. Unless the challenge specifically restricts it, you can move around and look for clues like street signs and business names to find out where you are. The image below shows a basic overview of the Geoguessr screen layout and controls.

Once you think you know the location — or are nearly out of time — you use the inset map to place your marker where you believe the round started. After you hit “Guess,” you will see how close you were to the correct location and how many points your guess earned. The closer you are to the location, the higher your score, with a maximum score of 5,000 points. On a map that covers a small area, like the Gary-New Duluth neighborhood, being off by a few blocks will cost you a lot of points. On a map that has locations from around the world, you will get nearly all the points just for finding the right city. The maximum error for a perfect score also changes by map size, but in general if you are within 50 feet (15 meters) you will always get the full 5,000 points.

Not often, but every now and then, GeoGuessr gets a little buggy. If the underlying Streetview imagery has changed since the game was made, sometimes it repeats the last round, gives a black screen, or doesn’t allow a guess to be made. If that happens, please let me know and I’ll update the challenge.

At the end of the five rounds, an overview screen shows your score for each round in addition to your guessing time and how far off you were from the correct location. The correct locations and your guesses are also shown on a map and you can click on any of the round numbers to review the locations. Additionally, the final screen in a challenge will show how you rank compared to the top scorers of the challenge. When choosing your user name, keep in mind that your user name and score per round will be visible to other players of the challenge.

If you have feedback on this challenge or ideas for future challenges, please share them in the comments below.