Round Lake Michigan - Day Five

Stanwood, Michigan to Cadillac, Michigan to St. Ignace, Michigan

The original online journal entry:

Actual Date: 2005-07-15
Uploaded: Fri, 15 Jul 2005 19:33:49 -040
Distance: 84.90 km

Last night was an interesting night of free/stealth camping. As I set up camp I saw a red fox ghost by to see what I was doing. Once I got into my hammock I could hear other animals snooping around.

The bear keg worked well since they snooped around it and left me and the bike alone.

The day started early at 04:30. With the hilly terrain and higher then normal temperatures it's a necessity if you really want to get the mileage in.

The riding today was great once my body got going. It was a sluggish start with my body really wanting a day off. Three or four hours later my legs finally got their punch back and I started hitting the hills hard climbing some at 27 km/hr.

Today I met up with two other cyclists doing a mini-tour from Grand Rivers to Cadillac. It was fun to talk with them although I noticied that the dad seemed to take insane delight telling me about the hills coming up.

The last few days have been trying ones for me. The biggest pressure is making sure that I am back in Waukesha, Wisconsin in time for the ride home. As a result of the heat, hills and distance I've basically been riding from extremely early in the morning to last light of the evening.

My preferred rest day location is St. Ignace but that's about 1.5 days riding time away.

Once I reached Cadillac a new option surfaced with the offer of a ride to St. Ignace. I've decided to take it.

This gives me back a riding day, puts me at my desired location for a rest day and ideally sets me up for riding US2 west, a road that I have been looking forward to for days.

If this was a fifteen day riding tour then I think I would have declined. As time is more limited then taking the ride gives me a chance to make the tour more fun and less pressure intense.

I am sure that there are still many more long riding days ahead of me. It will be interesting to see how much of a difference the ride really made.

~Jamie N

Post tour comments about this day:

By day five of any tour I am usually looking forward to taking a rest stay to give my body a chance to recover from the new demands that are being placed upon it. Although I credit the fixed-gear bike for giving me much stronger legs at the start of this tour then at other points in the past my body was still looking forward to a break.

I also wanted to give my butt a chance to heal completely. The handlebar adjustment had worked incredibly well so all that was left was to let the residual issues heal up a bit.

The heat wave, the memory of the sunrise from the first day of this tour and the fact that I was stealth camping got me up and out of bed right at 04:30. As I put away my camping gear I watched the sun begin to rise. Just as the sun began to actually be visible I hit the road again.

A nice thing about riding so early in the morning when you are dealing with hot weather is that you start the day with nice cool temperatures and a refreshing mist. Unfortunately the mist tends to hang in low areas so I often came across incredible picture opportunities at the bottom of hills rather then the top. Like most cyclists I have a real problem allowing myself to stop at the bottom of a fast descent.

The first town of the day was Big Rapids where I stopped and enjoyed a nice breakfast, grabbed some more cash from an ATM and uploaded the days log. After a short break I hit the road again. As you can see from the profile today was largely a climbing day with a few descents. After every descent I ended up going up another hill with the net result being a definate increase in altitude.

Just north of Big Rapids I met a gentleman who volunteers on the White Pine Bicycle Trail. He mentioned that it was nearby and since it was an old railroad it was a nice easy grade. This trail was paved from Big Rapids to Reed City although they hoped to someday pave the remainder.

I like mixing things up a bit when I tour so I headed north to the next cross road and followed it until I came to the junction with the trail. When I was a kid I used to love trains and converted rail trails seem to bring me back to that time so it was no surprise to hear me occassionally chugging along like a train in the slight incline with the occassional quiet horn blowing sound as I passed people.

As the paved portion of the trail ended I met up with a man and wife who were preparing to get started on the trail. The man is dropped off at one end of the trail while his wife drives the car to the other end. Once she arrives at that end she begins walking the trail. When they meet he continues on to pick up the car while she moves forward to the next major road. In this way they both get to do their preferred activity in a way that seems to work well for them. I think I talked with them for about 20 minutes about a number of things including tires, spokes, rims, the general area and of course bicycle touring.

I left the trail at Reed City mainly because I wanted to stop in at an excellent general store that they told me about. Once I left the trail the hills became more agreesive again in a positive way. Reaching the store I purchased a couple of sandwiches and asked to use the washroom. Imagine my surprise when the gentleman running the store identified me as canadian based on my use of the word "washroom" rather then bathroom or restroom. That led to an interesting conversation about other key word differences. The word "about" is often used in the Southern states to identify canadians but in this part of Michigan the way we spoke the word sounded very similar making it an unlikely choice. The store was very nice, clean and fun to visit for a bit. ( I later noticed that some people really became confused if you asked to use the washroom. A nice girl told me that in this part of Michigan good alternatives are bathroom, rest room and crapper closet(it's true)).

Although I had the opportunity to get back on the rail trail and despite having run into a couple who had just used the rail trail to travel from Cadillac to this small town I decided to stick with the hillier road. It was while on this road that I first encountered my first pair of bicycle tourists while I was taking a shade break next to an old graveyard. These two were a father/son team traveliing from Grand Rapids to Cadillac via the rail trail. They were basically riding mountain bikes with two water bottles each and last night they stayed in a nearby motel. The rest of their family was staying in a campground at Cadillac which they expected to reach in mid-afternoon.

After a good conversation I headed on my way. I expected them to pass me at some point but for some strange reason I started pedalling faster and they never did. When we eventually met again in Cadillac I learned that they found the hills a bit of a challenge especially as they ran low on water. A very nice group of guys who were a lot of fun to hang out with for a bit.

Over my lunch break I found myself carefully considering my options to complete the ride around Lake Michigan in the time allotted. A number of things went through my head including the possiblity of strong headwinds as I headed west, slower days if the hills increased in size and intensity as I headed north and the ability to catch a ride of some sort in the westernmost portions of my route. It was during this time that a ride opportunity was offered and accepted.

Taking a ride was a difficult decision for me because I have always completely circled the lake by bicycle in the past and with enough time this would have also been the case here as well. The irony was that at this point I was enjoying one of the most incredibly fun days of the tour so far. Sure it was hot, hilly and humid but it was FUN!

In hindsight I am glad that I took the ride at this point. I intend to come back and finish this part of the tour under pedal power most likely as the beginning or end of my Round Lake Superior tour or even as an independant segment. From talking to other cyclists later on in the tour I quickly learned that this part of the Lake Michigan coast is often seen as one of the best areas to tour. Of course the nearby hills also make this a very appealing place to do a circle tour at some point as well. Lots of options and with the addition of some time then I can really enjoy what this area has to offer.

The amusing thing about the ride is that I thought that it would allow me to get back to riding 120 km/days but in reality I still needed to ride the longer days to make my rendevous in time. I was lucky and only experienced one heavy headwind day. If I had been one day further east when that day appeared then I would have had two or even three moderate to heavy headwind days to contend with.

The drive to St. Ignace was long feeling compared to riding a bicycle. Sure it was faster but somehow so much life is removed when you get in a car and enter a freeway. It was neat to actually drive across the Mackinaw Bridge linking the Upper and Lower Penisulas. Last year when I crossed between the two I did so by ferry. I suspect that when I return I will again enjoy a ferry ride so this was a unique experience for me.

Arriving at the campground I was able to obtain the same campsite that I used during last year's Round Lake Huron tour. I also picked out five books from the camp library to have a selection to choose from tomorrow to read during my rest day. The surprising thing to me was that the campground owners seemed to remember me.

I guess that the best part was taking a nice long hot shower and enjoying the thought of sleeping in and doing absolutely nothing for an entire day even through I knew that by the next day I would be clamouring to get back on the bike and ride some more.

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