July 8, 2025
What We Have Here is a Hung Jury
I just can’t decide if yesterday or today was the better day. I know, that’s a first world problem, so I won’t complain or frankly stress over trying to decide.
Most of today’s route was along the shoreline of Lake Michigan. Even when I was riding through the forest, you could almost always see the lake. For the first hour of the ride, I was moving along at a pretty good clip. The next 30 minutes, not so much. But it wasn’t PSG’s fault. And it wasn’t my fault. It was the asphalt…or should I say lack thereof. The route went through Wilderness State Park and on a road that may have been last maintained in the 1940’s. However once out of the park, the road turned to sweet asphalt and then to The Tunnel of Trees.
The Tunnel of Trees is basically a 22 mile narrow road where the trees create a canopy over almost the entire length of the road. Traffic is light and the speed limit is cyclist friendly. If there was a negative, it was that I kept stopping to take pictures and still missed a ton of photos I should have taken.
Soon after the Tunnel of Trees came the bike paths. They pretty much took me the whole rest of the way…from Petosky State Park to my final destination or Charlevoix. And again I almost always a view of the lake.
It was on the bike paths today that I found my people stories.
First I met 79 years young Sean O’Shea. He was a local riding along the path, who stopped to chat for a while. We of course talked about cycling and shared cycling stories. And we talked about life and shared some life stories too. That would all have been enough to make it a memorable event, but then he asked me what type of GPS I was using. I told him a Garmin. He then looked and saw I didn’t have a rear traffic sensor. The next thing he said was “can I give you mine”. I said thanks but I was almost done on this trip and that wouldn’t be necessary. Now folks, that is not a $5 piece of bike equipment and he was literally going to give me his! We exchanged contact info and said we’d stay in touch.
A bit later on the bike path in Petosky, I met Jane. Jane is a volunteer trail ambassador and she approached me to see if I needed any directions. I told I thought I was ok, but then she informed that a part of the path was closed. Instead of telling me about the detour route, she road along with me until we were through the detour and back of the bike path. She also explained to me what Petosky Stones are.
The Petoskey stone, Michigan's official state stone, is a fossilized coral that's roughly 350 million years old. They can be found on the beaches of Lake Michigan in of course the Town of Petosky (other places too I guess).
People always ask me about the bad people I meet on my rides, I’m still looking for them. Most of the folks I meet are like Sean and Jane. Thank you both for contributing to a great adventure.
And just when you thought it was safe to stop reading and I thought my day was over…
The final leg of my day’s journey took me to The Charlevoix (pronounced Shar Le Voy) Mushroom Houses. These are houses designed by Earl Young beginning in 1919 and continuing into the 1970’s. He designed over two dozen houses and they were all built using indigenous materials. Lots of pictures.
Whew…I think I’m finally done. Except of course for the pictures.
Tomorrow is the final riding day of the trip. I will meet Mrs G, Tom and Melanie in Traverse City hopefully in time to get a shower and join them for lunch.
Until tomorrow
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Again ….such beauty
3 weeks ago
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3 weeks ago
Today's ride: 74 miles (119 km)
Total: 1,007 miles (1,621 km)
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