Ride after the storm

Riding after the storm

Our night listening to live music at our campsite got cut short last night when the rains began. We headed into my van to play games. It’s nice to have a place for all of us to hang out when the weather goes bad. It rained on and off all night long and sometimes hard. The rain let up around 9am. What we didn’t know was how severe it was for the surrounding areas. Just like yesterday we got super lucky that the bad weather missed us. The towns of Charlevoix and Petoski took the brunt of the storm losing trees, losing power and having flooding. There was debris all over the roads for miles. 

My plan for the day was to go for a 45-50 mile ride in the morning and meet Jill and Angie for lunch. But with the morning ride I told them I would meet them at camp. Still planning for the same distance ride just starting up north after the roads dried. I took my time driving around Torch Lake and exploring the back roads. I wound up finding a pretty cool cairn monument, some fresh delicious cherry pie and the World’s Biggest Cherry Pie monument.

I got to Charleviox to start my ride around 1pm, thinking a 3 hour ride would still give me plenty of time to meet at the campsite and then have dinner. I used my Garmin to map a 48 mile roundtrip route. What I didn’t notice that there was no cell service at all in this small town. So it actually had a different town as the start. I did a short loop to see some very fancy houses and just let the Garmin recalculate a couple of times before finally following the planned route.

Garmin does give very good turn by turn directions with plenty of time before the turn and usually on bike friendly roads with little traffic. But what doesn’t seem to do in Michigan is avoid the gravel and dirt roads. Normally that is not an issue but today I was riding my Ceepo road bike and just wanted smooth roads. Probably the second road I turned on to turned to gravel about 4 miles along but do to construction. That lasted about another 4 miles. I was warned my an old guy riding a fully loaded touring bike going the opposite direction. For the next 15 miles or so it felt like I was riding on a very slow roller coaster going up and down, up and down over and over. I was able to keep a good pace but at the top of each peak you could see the next peak looming. 

It wasn’t until I was at what I thought was my halfway point that I had my first thought I might be off course but I ignored it. With the whirling wing and sun almost straight over head I got confused about what direction I was going. I thought I was starting to go back. But I was enjoying the ride so much I just rode until I saw I sign for Torch Lake I thought crap I’m not going towards Charleviox. 

During this whole ride so far I had not passed but one place to get food or water. So I continued to Alden, this was my original start location that I entered on my Garmin the night before. Alden is teeny tiny about half a block long and with mostly antique shops and a few ice cream and pizza places. It does have a small general store but of course it is not open on Sunday, either were many of the other stores. I tried the ice cream place but it wasn’t opening until 6pm. A gentleman at a antique store offered me to fill my water bottles from the bathroom sink. Perfect. He gave me directions to get me back to Charleviox in a more direction way. 40 miles down, probably 35 miles to go. 

This route took me right along Torch Lake for 10 miles or so offering glimpses of the lake from time to time. Most of the day the roads are tree covered so staying out of the direct sun is awesome. Since I started heading back I was using google maps on my phone because I didn’t trust my Garmin to stay off of gravel roads. Almost at Eastport both the phone and Garmin were guiding me onto a gravel road, reluctantly I took it for a mile or so. Got to the other side and realized they both were rerouting my return. After a heated argument me the little lady who lives in my phone, I disobeyed her and continued to Eastport. 

From there I found a place for more water and food. It was a gas station grocery store. I grabbed a water, vitamin water and a slice of pizza. The kid behind the counter was very funny. He charged me for the waters but said “ I’m not sure to charge you for THAT, it’s too old! “ I thanked him and ate it anyway. I just wanted fuel to get back. 

Now I only had 15 miles to go. The winds were strong all day but now they were mostly at my back. That kept me going feeling strong and I kept a good pace all the way back to my van. My van such a beautiful sight when a 45 mile ride turns into a 77 mile ride. All in all a wonderful day on the bike. 

Thanks for writing.