June 26, 2018
Day 39 Flambeau
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Flambeau, WI
Woke up with the sun, then rolled over and slept another hour or so. Based on the forecast and radar, it looked like we might be riding in the rain regardless of when we started, so we may as well snooze . Then we took a little more time and walked across the street to the bustling diner for breakfast. We ordered up proper Gary Zaremsky biking omelettes and hit the road. At the 20 mile point, we stopped in Hayward - home of the musky fest and the world lumberjack championships! We grabbed a couple of hot beverages at Caribou and some fresh made sandwiches to fuel the next 50 miles. The riding was pretty easy today, a few climbs and rolling ups and downs, beautiful scenery though as we rode along and near different branches of the Chippewa River. At 55 miles, we stopped in Winter, WI and thoroughly confused the cashier. We asked if we could fill up our water bottles, but there wasn’t a water dispenser in their fountain beverage setup. She said we could fill them in the bathroom sink. Ew, would you do that? When Jon asked if they had a sink in their food prep area, she said yes, but you can’t go back there. She asked the employee in that area to fill our bottles and that lady said, “oh just come on back here. No problem.” Control freak vs easy going I guess. We also tried to see if we could find anyone who could check the weather radar as we had no service on our phones (and no available wifi at the gas station). Apparently few people are as obsessed with the weather conditions as we are. 😂 We finally found one fellow who said he’d checked a few hours before and it looked like the storms to the south were breaking up. Only 15 miles to go, so we crossed our fingers and hoped for the best. There was a light rain after about 20 minutes, but nothing requiring rain gear. About 5 miles from our destination, a huge black bear was in the middle of the road and scampered off into the woods. Kinda glad we’re not camping tonight.
We got to the Flambeau Forest Inn around 4:30 and checked in. We’d made a reservation a few days ago based on the rainy forecast. On cue, it started sprinkling just as we arrived (but again, didn’t last long). It was pretty clear that reservations hadn’t really been necessary, as the parking lot for the motel area was empty. But it is mid week. We unlocked and checked out the room. Lots of wood for that cabin-like rustic look; the beds had ancient bedspreads on them. We pulled down the covers and there was dirt on the sheets. Um. No. So Jon goes back up to the check in (at the restaurant next door). The owner comes storming over to the room and looks at the sheets, comes back out, slams the door and walks away. It was hard to tell if he was pissed at us or his staff. He came back and checked the other 5 rooms. Four hadn’t been made up yet but the last one was. He unlocked it and walked away to let us check it out. It seemed ok, the sheets looked a little worse for wear, but looked like they’d been cleaned anyway. He said something about how the cleaning person would be hearing out this. Honestly, it’s a place that seems like it’s seen better days and probably doesn’t bring in enough money to keep it up to date and well kept. But it was better than the state forest tenting option, so we stayed. We went to the restaurant for dinner and entered at the same time as a family of 5. The kids were running all over and screaming and yelling. Now, I know kids are kids and I can certainly have fun with them. But, when you’re tired and hangry from a long day of biking, it’s like sensory overload. Then we asked the waitress what beer that had. She replied, “too many to remember, what style of beer do you like?” “Well that depends on what you have. Do you have a list?” “No”, she says, “it changes every couple of weeks.” Oy vey. The dinner ordering process was similar; we ended up with broasted chicken, sweet potato fries and salads. We were fairly close to the bar area and overheard some interesting conversations about nail gun accidents, eating vegan, drinking “human milk” and how peanut butter doesn’t actually have butter in it. After dinner, we walked down the ATV trail to a small backwater inlet to the nearby Lake of the Pines and saw a duck family.
By the time we were climbing into bed, Jon said something about hoping there weren’t things crawling on him all night long and I instantly started feeling itchy. Could have been the mosquitoes from our walk. At least that’s what I told myself.
Today's ride: 70 miles (113 km)
Total: 1,614 miles (2,597 km)
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