On the eve of the National Cherry Festival, Traverse City’s biggest tourism week of the entire year, northern Michigan has landed a few more notices from national publications that could send even more curious travelers here in the weeks, months, and years to come. This time around, the spotlights are coming from the New York Times and AFAR.

Arriving just a year after the last New York Times article about Traverse City, the new one, published last month, serves up an itinerary for “A Sweet and Savory Road Trip in Northern Michigan.” The article, written by Christine Chitnis, posits that “the best way to experience the flavors of the land and the lakes is by visiting local farm stands, orchards, wineries and fisheries to gather the region’s bounty at the source.” It goes on to highlight local establishments like Farm Club, Loma Farm, Cooks’ House, Sugar2Salt, Taproot Cider House, Lakeview Hill Farm, Interwater Farms, Idyll Farms, Leelanau Cheese, Carlson’s Fishery, Bellaire Smokehouse, BOS Wine, and the wineries of Old Mission and Leelanau.

AFAR, meanwhile, focuses specifically on the region's wine scene, highlighting its “more than 2,000 acres of vineyards spread across nearly 40 wineries.” Published earlier this week and written by Alexandra Gillespie, the piece, titled “No One Thought This State Would Start Making Some of the Best Wine in the U.S.,” zeroes in on how climate change is making northern Michigan even more of a wine hub than it used to be.

“The area has gained four extra weeks of wine-growing temperatures over the past 40 years, says Dr. Steven Schultze, an agricultural climatologist who researched the impact of climate change on Michigan wine production to earn his PhD degree at Michigan State University,” reads one section of the article. “The region now routinely hits the 180-day threshold needed to ripen vinifera vines (the type of grapevine that produces 90 percent of the world’s wine).”

Numerous local wineries get specific callouts in the AFAR piece, including Black Star Farms, Chateau Grand Traverse, Gilchrist Farm Winery & Restaurant, Mari Vineyards, Mawby, and others.