Round Lake Michigan - Day One

Waukesha, Wisconsin to Chicago, Illinois

Perhaps early morning isn't so bad after all!
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An old farmhouse that's being demolished to make way for a church.
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The original online journal entry:

Actual Date: 2005-07-11
Uploaded: Tue, 12 Jul 2005 06:42:45 -040
Distance: 160.00 km

Today I was up and on the road at, gasp, the crack of dawn.

There was a beautiful mist above the nearby fields and beneath the rapidly lightening early morning sky.

Perhaps there are some benefits to getting up that early after all. {grin}

For the first hour after my early morning breakfast at McDonalds I think I climbed and descended through the same 70 feet of elevation over and over. The view and exceptionally courteous drivers more then made up for it and it was nice to be in the hills again!

Eventually I headed more westerly and reached the shoreline of Lake Michigan at Racine having consumed a power lunch of mashed potatoes, turkey sandwich and vanilla milkshake along the way.

Lake Michigan Circle Tour sign.
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For several hours I stayed on Sheridan Drive until I discovered an interesting bike path near the Great Lakes Training Facility. This path provided shade, cooler temperatures and plenty of pleasant people to converse with. It also a very long path. I believe that I enjoyed it's charms for close to three hours before leaving it behind to enjoy riding in some very quiet and very expensive neighbourhoods.

A beautiful farm under an amazing sky.
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Just to end the riding experience on a complete note I spent the last hour riding in Chicago traffic. It really didn't seem that bad although the giant red saddlebags and the streaming yellow bicycle touring 101 flag may have helped.

Fellow Icebiker Bill Milbratz offered me a place at his place in Chicago so that's where I am tonight. We went out to supper and went for a walk to check out the beginning of my ride tomorrow. Quite an enjoyable time. Time for bed. Tomorrow should be another day of great adventures.

-Jamie

Post tour comments about this day:

I remember being incredibly surprised by how beautiful the sunset was when I eventually got underway. Rarely am I up at the early hour of 5:30 Eastern (and since I was actually in the Central time zone it was even earlier then I realized). Temperatures were already mildly warm and as you can see in the pictures mist was in the air.

Crossing my first state line into Illinois.
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A very small part of my three hour ride on the Chicago bike paths.
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The first part of the day was spent playing around in the hills south of Waukesha. The blue sky did an incredible job of contrasting with the yellow fields. This whole area has been suffering from a lack of water for some time so even a touch of rain would have been welcomed on this day by the local farmers.

Although the Sheridan Road wasn't too bad to ride one of my pleasant surprises on this day was the discovery of a bike path that paralleled the road. The path would go for awhile, disappear and then start back up again. It featured shade and it was mainly paved so it was a good choice for a way into Chicago.

Eventually I exited the path surprisingly close to my destination. There were a lot of very expensive looking homes near parks and old churches. Traffic picked up as well but nothing as extreme as I would have expected for such a large city.

Meeting Bill was neat. He is a fellow Icebiker who also plays around with a fixed-gear bike. It appears that he is considering going on a bike tour at some point in the future. A very pleasant man who went out of his way to make me feel right at home. His directions to the lakefront path the next day were very helpful as well.

Another noteworthy event on this day was the discovery and photo of a Lake Michigan Circle Tour sign.

Some monster bikes.
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Fellow Icebiker Bill Milbratz.
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