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| My ride U.P. North. 10/8/24 dwm |
The second day of the trip, I wanted to stretch my legs since there wasn't a place to work out at our hotel. The afternoon before, when we stopped to see the Grand Island East Channel light across from the headquarters of the Pictured Rocks National Lake-shore the sun was behind it, a ride to see it after sunrise seemed like a good idea.
It wasn't a long ride, just a four and a half-miles along Lake Superior so I could get some pictures during the golden hour.
As I got close to the park headquarters, the morning sun was bathing the island in a golden glow of light.
I forgot to bring my tripod on this trip, which would have been tough to carry on a bike, so I had to be creative. A section of a drifted tree trunk became a platform where I could secure it while focusing on the house. (see photo below right)
There was another guy on the beach, taking pictures and enjoying the morning. From the area originally, he was visiting from Indiana with plans to return home It was a nice conversation, and we wished each other well.
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| The Grand Island East Channel light. 10/5/24 dwm |
The ride from the hotel and back was 9-and-a-half miles. On this trip, my rides were going to be short, a lot shorter than the ones at home. That fits the time available and are more comfortable.
Three days later, we were in Sault Ste. Marie, where we spent two nights. After a ferry ride in the morning, my wife went shopping and sent me to explore downtown on the bike.
Sault Ste. Marie isn't as 'bike-friendly' as Madison, but it's only a town of 15,000 people so I'll give them some slack. I used a sidewalk along the main road from our hotel to downtown because there wasn't a bike lane. Surprisingly, there were bike lanes downtown, so I returned to the streets.
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| The Soo Locks. 10/8/2024 dwm |
After that, I picked up a few things at a gift shop before riding down to a Pasty Shop where we stopped the day before. On Mondays, they only sold frozen pasties, Tuesday I could get one fresh from the oven which seemed like the right kind to try.
Afterwards I stopped at the Tower of History to look over the community, before returning to the hotel, logging another 9.5 miles.
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| A beautiful turn-around point. 10/8/24 dwm |
Wednesday, in St. Ignace, we checked into the hotel mid-afternoon, after unloading the car, I took the bike out.
It's another small town with no bike paths, as far as I could tell, so I headed south and west from our hotel to a roadside park with a beautiful view of the Mackinac Bridge.
The community of St. Ignace hugs the shoreline, which is good for business. Mackinac Island is a big tourist attraction and the water attracts people in at least three seasons of the year, if not four. There is something special about a town on a lake. This ride around town added 8 more miles.
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| Lake Michigan view in Marinette. 10/10/24 dwm |
Our last night was in Marinette, Wisconsin and we arrived in time for one more ride.
The hotel is on a busy road with a shopping center across the street and a four-lane highway to the west. East seemed like the best direction to ride so I could see the lake.
An advantage of riding along Lake Michigan was that the roads were flat. This was my longest stretch on the Schwinn in years and I was surprised to find the speedometer working!
I thought it was broke, but the only necessary adjustment was moving the gizmo on the spoke so the counter could read its signal every revolution. The battery is several years old, so that needs to be replaced. It's the only reason I can think of for what happened at the end of the ride.
As I came to a stop at a stop light, the speed showed 62 miles per hour (!!) and the odometer was spinning almost as fast. It read a legitimate 15 miles for the trip. The four rides totaled 42 miles, total miles in 2023 up to 1,352.
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