The Great Lakes can be treacherous when storms blow in — the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum estimates that the lakes are home to more than 6,000 sunken ships. Among them is the SS Edmund Fitzgerald, which was loaded with more than 26,000 tons of iron ore pellets in Wisconsin on November 9, 1975, before setting off for Detroit and Toledo. The weather on Lake Superior deteriorated overnight, and the last radio contact came the evening of November 10, when the ship disappeared.

According to baseball legend, Babe Ruth’s first official home run sent a ball straight into Lake Ontario, where it remains to this day. In 1914, Ruth joined the Providence Grays, and in September of that year, the team traveled to Hanlan’s Point, Toronto, to play the Toronto Maple Leafs. In the sixth inning, Ruth hit a home run, sending the ball far out of the stadium.

What is now the Goderich Salt Mine was discovered by accident in 1866. A local flour mill owner was drilling for oil in the hope of striking it rich, and instead found rock salt, the first bed ever found in North America. Much of the mine is located some 1,800 feet below Lake Huron. That’s as deep as Toronto’s CN Tower is tall.

The waters of the Great Lakes maintain a thriving ecosystem with more than 170 fish species. Carp, catfish, bass, trout, perch, and walleye are among the most commonly caught species. The largest native species is the lake sturgeon, which can weigh up to 200 pounds and measure as tall as a full-grown human.

Marblehead Lighthouse, located along the banks of Lake Erie, was first lit in 1822. The lighthouse is located in a town of the same name about halfway between Cleveland and Toledo. The original tower was 15 feet shorter than the one standing today, until it was expanded in 1898. The state park surrounding the lighthouse attracts an estimated 1 million visitors each year.

On September 10, 1813, one of the largest battles of the short-lived War of 1812 took place near the western end of Lake Erie. Nine American ships, led by Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, defeated six British warships — the first unqualified defeat of a British naval squadron in history. The Battle of Lake Erie ensured U.S. control over Lake Erie, as well as most of the Great Lakes region, by forcing the British out of Detroit.

Just like the infamous Bermuda Triangle, the Lake Michigan Triangle is where boats and flights mysteriously disappear. The triangle reaches from Benton Harbor, Michigan; north to Manitowoc, Wisconsin; and then east to Ludington, Michigan. The first spooky incident in the Lake Michigan Triangle happened in 1891, when the Thomas Hume schooner and all its crew mysteriously disappeared in the lake.

The sandy shores of the Great Lakes are home to the largest freshwater coastal dune system in the world. Lake Michigan alone is surrounded by more than 275,000 square acres of sand dunes. National and state parks — such as Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore and Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore — offer access to these magnificent dunes.

The Great Lakes — Superior, Huron, Michigan, Ontario and Erie — together span more than 95,000 square miles. But hydrologically speaking, two of those five famous lakes are technically one giant lake. Lake Huron and Lake Michigan are connected by the five-mile-wide Straits of Mackinac, which maintains both lakes’ water at the same level, allowing them to be considered one continuous lake.

Lake Erie may be the second-smallest of the Great Lakes, but it can claim at least one superlative: It’s the shallowest. Erie has an average depth of 62 feet — compare that to the deepest and largest of the Great Lakes, Lake Superior, which has an average depth of 500 feet.

Perhaps no other state better deserves the nickname the “Great Lake State” than Michigan, as it’s surrounded on all sides by these enormous bodies of water. Even still, Michigan touches only four out of the five Great Lakes, leaving out Lake Ontario. Michigan's mitten shape is carved by Lakes Superior, Erie, Huron, and, of course, Michigan.

About 35,000 islands are scattered throughout the Great Lakes. Most are tiny and uninhabited. The largest is Manitoulin Island, located at the northern end of Lake Huron. It has an area of 1,068 square miles and is the world’s largest freshwater lake island. The island itself also has 108 small lakes. Approximately 12,600 people live permanently on Manitoulin Island, but the population grows significantly during tourist season.

The Straits of Mackinac are narrow channels that connect Lake Michigan to Lake Huron and also separate Michigan’s Upper Peninsula from the rest of the state. The straits are frequently traveled for shipping goods from the Great Lakes region to the East Coast. The Mackinac Bridge, one of the longest suspension bridges in the world, crosses over the straits.

The thunderous Niagara Falls are part of the Niagara River on the border between Canada and the U.S. Water empties from Lake Erie into the Niagara River, which flows north through the falls and into Lake Ontario, the last in the Great Lakes chain, before flowing through the St. Lawrence River to the Atlantic Ocean.

Of the eight U.S. states that border the Great Lakes, New York is the only one that also borders an ocean. The western edge of New York has coasts on both Lake Ontario and Lake Erie; on its eastern side, the state meets the Atlantic Ocean.

Of the five Great Lakes, Lake Ontario features bite-sized greatness at 7,340 square miles. It packs a big punch, though. Ontario is the lake chain’s outlet, linking to the Atlantic Ocean. And despite its relative smallness, with a length of 193 miles and a width of 53 miles, Lake Ontario’s size still ranks it among the largest lakes in North America.

The Great Lakes — Erie, Huron, Michigan, Ontario, and Superior — hold approximately 21% of all the fresh water on Earth’s surface and about 84% of North America’s surface fresh water. Their combined coastline extends for over 10,000 miles. Some 34 million people live within the Great Lakes Basin, representing almost a third of the Canadian population and nearly 10% of the U.S. population.

Four of the five Great Lakes form a natural border between the U.S. and Canada. The only exception is Lake Michigan, which is located entirely within the U.S. The Great Lakes were the subject of much dispute between the two nations until the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909, which established the borders that we see today.

The Great Lakes border eight U.S. states: New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. The lakes also form a natural boundary between the U.S. and the Canadian province of Ontario. However, Iowa does not border any of the Great Lakes.

Made up of Lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan, and Superior, the Great Lakes cover an area of 94,250 square miles — the largest surface of freshwater in the world. Their combined coastline extends for over 10,000 miles.

With a name like Lake Superior, it’s no wonder that it holds the largest volume of water out of all the Great Lakes. But it may come as a surprise that Lake Superior holds over 50% of the water in the entire Great Lake system. If you wanted to raise the lake’s water level by just one inch, you’d need to add another 500 billion gallons of water!