The Mariner North Restaraunt

What a gem of a restaurant and experience. The food prepared here has no business being served in the sleepy little town of Copper Harbor; what an absolutely pleasant surprise!

I had the Balsamic Sirloin salad, a bowl of Lake Chowder (a fish chowder), and a few selections from their fine offering of local (to Michigan) micro brews.

I found the chowder to be warm and well composed with a wonderful texture and perfectly done portions of veg and fish; this warm and peppery experience took the bite out of the chilled weather of the day.

While the chowder was very good, the Balsamic Sirloin salad stole the show. Perfectly composed of sweet and savory flavors left my pallet entertained and looking forward to the next bite. The steak was perfectly prepared to order. Frankly, I'm having trouble coming up with words to describe this wonderful experience.

This place is now on my recommended list, and I will likely entertain the notion of a 12 hour trip just to come back in the future.

Dog Friendly out front. You have to go inside and order and bring your order out to the picnic tables yourself. The smoked trout dip was the bomb. I could just eat it by the spoonful. We split one of their artisan grilled cheeses: the smokestack (smokedbacon, smoked turkey, smoked Gouda, spinach, tomato and bistro ranch) with fries. Food was tasty. My relative paid but I went in to get food. I really liked the interior. Copper Harbor is great. So is this place!

The food was mediocre at best. First bite of a chicken strip was a fatty piece. The Freighter sandwich was decent but nothing special. Nachos were dry with very little meat and lettuce. It was almost like chips and cheese, but the homemade salsa was great. Service was good. Waiter was friendly. Food arrived fast. Seemed pricey but what isn't these days.

Starting off. Great atmosphere, parked up at the tippy tip of the upper peninsula is practically snow mobile country. The mariner makes it easy to drop in for a casual meal, relatively good pricing for quantity with respectable service, I didn't particularly think the meal was a 5 star simply because the beer battered haddock I had was too dry for my liking, a very common thing when deep frying battered fish and I've been spoiled by some seriously good fish and chips out and about in Maine, Massachusetts and London so I may have been overly biased in my assessment. The server Ana even asked if I was alright and if there was anything I would want to replace the meal, I had to decline as I've already practically finished 3/4 of my fish - plus the fish chowder and mushroom sandwiches came out delicious.