Todays the day…the last day to ride our fully loaded touring bikes for a while. The day we will turn off our touring life and resume regular everyday life. These long tours always make me feel like I live two different lives. Andrea and Rob made a fantastic breakfast to fuel us for the final stretch. Today would be a short day’s ride, but even better. Our good friend Wilson decided to ride out to meet us and ride with us back to Buffalo. He arrived right on time as we had just finished packing our bikes. We said goodbye to my aunt and uncle, Cooper the dog, and my cousins Emily and Ava, but we know it won’t be too long before we see them again. The route we took back to Buffalo was lovely. We rode close to the lake on the back roads before it re-joined route 5. Along that road, we got our first glimpses of the Buffalo skyline along the shoreline of Lake Erie. I made the boys stop at the beach in Hamburg so I could take my Lake Erie photo (a little silly because we live right here), but I had to since it had become my goal to stand in all 5 great lakes this month. Now I just have to go back to my hometown to get Lake Ontario! We pedaled past my dad’s work, past the Botanical Gardens in South Buffalo, and before we knew it, we were back on Filmore Ave saying Adios to Wilson after a fun day’s ride. The last few miles down main street flew by, even though I was SO excited to see my kitty. I also had a feeling my Grammy may be waiting at our house, so I was excited to see if I was correct, there, too! Bumpity bump.. we were on the brick road, then on Pelham. That’s when I see Grammy’s car (I was right!). Grammy was pulling some of our (mountains of) weeds in the garden when we pulled in. And just like that, at about 12:45, the trip was over. We got off our bikes and I ran inside to see Charlie. It was SO weird walking into our own house. At first it didn’t feel like home since we hadn’t been there in so long. Charlie was sitting on the couch and when I started talking to her, she got up, definitely looking confused. It took her a good minute or two to realize her dreams had finally come true and we were home. Then, she began to purr louder than I ever remember her purring before. If I could purr, I would have been just as loud. It was so great to be holding my lovely little kitty. Grammy surprised us with an anniversary cake from Muscoreils bakery (they made our wedding cake) and a pizza for lunch, both great ideas because we didn’t have much in the way of food in our house. After a tasty lunch, Joe didn’t waste any time getting back in the swing of things as he went to work with Glen (our plumber friend who Joe sometimes helps out). Grammy and I enjoyed relaxing and talking about the bike tour while I procrastinated unpacking the bikes. The mound of mail was enormous, but I was happy to see our packages arrived. Amazingly the package we sent from North Dakota arrive just 2 or 3 days before we got home- we ALMOST beat the US postal service, but the poor postal service has taken a beating from the government lately, so its not surprising. I explored my garden to see what was growing (aside from all the weeds) and was amazed to find I had 7 pumpkins growing, as well as a bunch of tomatoes and peppers. It was dark by the time I finally started unpacking my bike. I guess I thought if I didn’t unpack it, the trip wouldn’t really be over? In the evening, a friend made a quick stop by with her daughter (a former student of mine) to say hello and welcome us back. While the trip is over, we still have so much to look forward to—Peter, the world traveler who we met in Minnesota would be here in a week, our kitchen/ downstairs renovation will start soon, the start of a historic school year (virtually) to prepare for, and future trips to dream of. And for now, we will continue to live by the motto: “I travel because I’d rather look back at my life, saying ‘I can’t believe I did that’ instead of ‘if only I had’.” – Florine Bos
Happy 9 years!! Hard to believe it’s already our anniversary again! But they always say, time flies when you are having fun, and I would definitely agree we have had loads of fun over the last 9 years! Since this hotel we were staying at didn’t have much in terms of breakfast (a granola bar isn’t breakfast…really). We opted to go out for breakfast, why not? We had an anniversary to celebrate! The hill down from the hotel made us get to our breakfast destination in record time, we even beat Joe’s parents who were in a car (but they were backed up because of construction). Bob Evans was conveniently located on the way out of town, and we hadn’t been there in ages. Yum! Such a good way to start the day. After saying goodbye to Joe’s parents, we were Angola bound! It was exciting, yet sad, to see signs reading “Buffalo 84 miles;” exciting to see Charlie and be home, but sad because our trip will be over, and it will probably be a long time before we can go on another long trip like this. While we could be home today if we wanted to be, it would get us home late in the day, and plus we want to stop and see my Aunt and Uncle and cousins! Getting home tomorrow will give us plenty of time to adjust to the trip being over and start to unpack. We passed through the section with all the vineyards before seeing the sign. New York; we made it back! We took our traditional photo, even though we have SO many at the NY sign now, but that’s ok. It was still bittersweet. After we were finished, a group of road crew workers from across the street started asking us about our travels. Before leaving the sign, my camera took a tumble, just missing the lens getting shattered (only a tiny chip from the rim on the lens), so I will call myself lucky yet again. We slowly made our way to Silver creek, along the all but too familiar route between Erie and Buffalo. While in Silver Creek, we planned to stop for ice cream (again, had to celebrate!). While we were enjoying some fantastic ice cream, Joe got a text from our friend Jon Rosen asking if Joe wanted to ride with him to Silver Creek tomorrow. Ha… what are the odds? Joe told him he was IN Silver Creek right now and was not going to ride back, however we did make plans to cross paths on his century plus ride tomorrow. After our ice cream stop, it seemed like we got to Uncle Rob and Aunt Andreas so quickly. It was great to stop back in as this was the first stop on our way out of Buffalo when we left in July! Kind of neat to go full circle. We had a lovely visit as always, enjoyed hot showers, and had a delicious spaghetti dinner and cake for dessert!!! Funny thing is on our Alaska bike tour, we had a spaghetti dinner in Anchorage on our 1-year anniversary! I see a theme- spaghetti and bike tour anniversaries… just a crazy coincidence, I guess. One of the wildest things is seeing your own news station again after watching so many other news stations from other cities and states—yep, definitely home! One more sleep until I get to give my fuzzy kitty a great big hug!
Today was the day we were going to see some of our family!! Yay! We got a little bit later of a start because we were pretty comfy in the hotel, but after eating a ton of the grab and go breakfast (which I thought was organized for Covid very well, here at the Hampton—they had a lady working breakfast so you could order a bagel, or English muffin, get hot eggs, etc. and she would prepare/ serve it on a plate for you). The roads on today’s ride began to get a little bit hillier, but nothing large. The big excitement for the ride today was riding by a car crash that had probably just happened about 10 minutes before as all the responders weren’t yet there. We were counting our blessings that we weren’t ahead of schedule just a little bit or we could have been caught up in that. Sure does wake you up a bit! As we got closer to towns, we found a nice bike path to take, which is always a welcome sign after dealing with the cars for a while. It was a fairly short bike path, but it was still a break. It brought us into the city of Geneva. We were a little bummed that we were in Geneva in the morning again as we were hoping to stop and see Rich at Rosemary’s Pizza, like he said to do. Unfortunately, it was way too early for the pizzeria to be open. Instead, we continued down familiar roads, passing by our camp spot from the night before we made it to Cleveland 45 days ago, and trying to wrack our brains to remember what was coming up next along the road. I seemed to remember a lot of landmarks a little better than Joey, although I still have a vivid memory of one section I thought we would pass, but it must be a different location from another trip or another state, because one of the parts I thought we would pass, never came to be. Weird how things get all jumbled when you have pedaled so many tens of thousands of miles. We stopped in the little town of Conneaut right before the PA border to eat my leftovers to keep us going until dinner. Soon after, we were in PA, only one state to get though before were back home, yikes! The miles to Erie went quickly, although slowly at the same time because we were excited to see family. We had plans for my Mom and Grandam, and Joe’s parents to meet at the Sloppy Duck Saloon/Restaurant in the harbor. It was right off the bike path, so it worked out perfectly for us. Being as excited as we were, we were a little out of it and rode right past by about a mile, and had to back track, oops! Guess we should have had google on to tell us where to go. Either way, we finally ended up there, greeted by hugs from Joe’s parents and my Mom and Grammy when they got there. It was so nice to see them after being away. This seems to be the meeting place whenever we come home on a bike tour! Dinner was delicious and spending time with family was even better. After saying our goodbyes to my Grammy and Mom, although it wasn’t too bad since we will be home in a day and a half, we headed for the hotel Joe’s parents booked on the outskirts of Erie. We had a nice hill to climb to get there, but that will make the morning’s ride that much more fun. A nice shower, which has now become the norm (weird!) for the last week of the trip was a perfect end to the day. For the rest of the night, we relaxed in the hotel room, trying to relish the last few days of the trip.
,Surprisingly, we got to see Keith in the morning, although I’m pretty sure he was up half the night working on his project. While it was a brief goodbye (since he was still working on his project), we enjoyed a bagel and some last fur time with the cats and Lou before departing. This morning, we got to see some different areas of Cleveland than we saw on the way through before, yet we still ended up on the same bike path by the park that lead right into downtown Cleveland. It was a pretty great bike path. We passed by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame again before taking the road that went by the airport. Then we were on the trail that was right next to the water again. The trail led us through the neighborhood of huge mansions on the lake before spitting us into a smaller suburb of Cleveland. Joe was hungry, so we stopped in a pavilion in a little park for a mid-morning cereal break to tide us over. Another 10 miles down the road or so, we ended up seeing a group of men riding road bikes. I told Joe to ride ahead because I know he wanted to catch them! And so, he did. When I finally caught back up with them, I learned that normally this group of guys rides around Lake Erie annually, however since they couldn’t do that this year because of covid, they were just out on a day ride. One of the guys, Peter (I think?), left the group to go towards his house and led us through a nice route that had less traffic. The company while riding was great, even if it only lasted 5 miles or so before he headed for home. Our next order of business was to find a bathroom, a pain in the bottom in town of Painsville (hahaa), but after several (frustrating) stops, we found one. We headed up the huge hill out of town, around a landslide that took out part of a road (again, we could get through the closed road with no problem being on bikes, pffew!), and made our way to find an ice cream shop, since that was on our list for the day. It was a bit hot, so the ice cream was melting pretty quickly, but it sure was delicious! What a great pit stop! As we continued on, we passed by a brand-new bridge that had just recently been put in over the gorge. You could still see the old rode that went down the super steep hill where there was, supposedly, a small bridge at the bottom that kept getting washed out. All I can say is that I’m glad I didn’t have to ride down, or up that hill! Our next bit of excitement came when we saw a faint view of a cyclist in the distance, clearly loaded down. As usual, we stopped so that we could chat. Our new friend Alex talked with us for quite a while. He was just starting out on a 2+ year trip, he was week in! He wants to go globally, however with covid, he just pans to ride around the country for now. Hopefully things will open up enough for him to continue his trek, and hey, maybe we will be lucky enough to have him stay with us when he is almost finished with his trip! We exchanged information and we plan to follow his journey, which is good to look forward to so we can live vicariously through him when our trip has ended. We were getting excited to be going back through the town of Geneva. Last time we were there it was in the morning, this time we would be spending the night there. We had been in contact with a lovely lady that we actually never officially met in person but was instead related to the amazing people in Butler, PA who rescued us during the snowstorm on the way home from our Alaska trip. She was extremely excited to have us stop and see her, and we were equally excited to meet another member of the family from Butler and surprised we could actually take her up on the offer of “if you ever need a place to stay in NE Ohio, let me know!” Gerri Ann was SO much fun. She ended up putting us up in a hotel because she said her house was not in hosting shape at the moment, but we at least got to spend a lovely evening with her! She picked us up from the (beautiful, newly built, SUPER comfy) Hampton Inn, and we headed for a super tasty Italian restaurant. It was a blast. Gerri Ann was so easy to talk to and laugh with. After a trying a new favorite drink and eating the restaurant out of house and home of little bread ball thingies and enjoyed some stellar calzones (they SURE were better than the ones we ate as a kid from the school cafeteria!!). When it was finally time to go back to the hotel, we were sad to have to part with Gerri Ann and her upbeat, happy, fun to be around personality. Hopefully our paths will cross again one day! Another fun filled day, and wonderful (we are becoming spoiled) night in a hotel.
Our day started as good as it ended yesterday, with great company and a homemade breakfast. We put our tent away for the last time on this trip (luckily) as we are done camping for this trip with the hotels, Warm Showers and family stays we have lined up for the remaining few days! Dale whipped up some bacon and eggs and we got to spend a little more quality time together before we had to hit the road for the day’s adventures. The roads continued to be mostly flat, although there were a few small hills here and there. Our mornings ride took us through the town of Milan where we were pleasantly surprised to have a little history lesson as it was the birthplace of Thomas Edison! This was not a planned stop, and we didn’t even know it was coming. You really never know what the day’s journey will bring! We of course poked around town seeing what there was to see, including the original town square area with the general store and workshop. It actually kind of reminded me of our visit to Lincoln’s home in Springfield in how it was maintained. Just down the street, was the home that Thomas Edison was born in, and we of course took the touristy photos sitting on the bench next to Edison! After our fund little surprising field trip, we continued on our way. As we were riding, we were going through areas near where we rode in from before we eventually were back on route 5 and seeing familiar territory. We opted for subs again for lunch ending up in the little town of Huron, where we ate breakfast on day 4. This time, we ate in the town park at the picnic tables. There, we had some curious tourists talking with us for a while, Joe did some work on the laptop and I made another wire bicycle. The sights all afternoon were familiar, and actually would be for the remainder of the trip. It does ease us into the end of the trip a little with being in familiar places, although it’s certainly not as exciting as seeing everything for the first time as you pedal on. My audio book kept me company for much of the day today, and with the increasing traffic on route 5, it was getting harder to hear it, which was a bummer. These audio books sure do make the miles melt away! It wouldn’t be long before we arrived in Cleveland again, happy to have a host for the night, because otherwise we would have a REALLY long day trying to get through the city (and we couldn’t recall any good camping spots just outside the city on the way through last time) or way too short of a day; when in a city, we don’t camp. Google lead us to our hosts house, although I was feeling really tired by the time we got there (that almost 100-mile day yesterday finally caught up with me!). Our host, Keith, was so welcoming right from the start. It took us a good 15 minutes to even go inside because we all started talking and hit it off right away. Eventually though, we moved our bikes inside and headed up to his 2nd floor apartment, which was decorated to the t (he is an architect). We were immediately greeted by his pandemic puppy, Lou- who happens to be deaf, so she tends to be a little clumsy, and his two cats Little Man and Mr. Mustard. Little man had a bit of an attitude (not a big fan of Lou), but Mr. Mustard was a sweetheart. Lou was very excited to have us there, that was quite obvious! She hadn’t had many guests because of Covid, so she could barely keep her excitement in! Keith had the king size bed all fixed up for us to sleep in tonight and was just getting ready to make dinner. We showered and helped a little with dinner. Keith went all out on dinner- we had huge beautiful cuts of lamb that he cooked on the grill. They were scrumptious! We sat up talking for quite a while before Keith had to go do some work on a project that was due in the morning. Exhausted, we hit the sack pretty early; me being pleasantly surprised that Mr. Mustard came to cuddle. That really makes me miss Charlie, but it won’t be long now, we’re comin’ Charlie Bug, 3 more sleeps!!!
We woke up early, even though we knew may not see our hosts this morning because they said they are late risers. We like to get a start on the day, so we don’t feel rushed or not make the miles we want to if something interferes. After packing up, just as we were leaving, David popped out of the garage and gave us some homemade fat bombs for the road. Planning to go out for breakfast in Ann arbor, just because it’s a neat little town, we started our search for a restaurant. On the way, we passed by the famous Michigan State stadium. I remember riding down that hill on the way out of town on our 2012 trip. Still impressive. We finally found a place for breakfast, although it turns out it was WAY overpriced, but we found that out after we sat down and felt rude leaving. Plus, we had company of a nice older gentleman and his grandson across the patio. Breakfast was delicious, even though expensive, and we enjoyed chatting with the locals. Leaving, we were SO excited to have a fantastic tail wind yet again today! It was really unbelievable. The miles were clocking in so fast it was hard to keep up. At one point, we had a little trouble finding a restroom, but other than that, it was a fantastic morning. Before we even realized, we had crossed the Ohio border (no sign indicating this) and we were entering Toledo. Another small city checked off our list. We passed through downtown, saw the skyline after we crossed the Maumee river and then decided we would treat ourselves to a sub for lunch since we didn’t feel like cooking and were super hungry. We finally found a sub shop in the suburbs of Toledo. Hard to believe we were back in Lake Erie turf once more. A small park not too far from the sub shop provided a perfect spot for lunch. The pavilion even had outlets, gotta love it! We devoured our subs and even after taking a somewhat long lunch break, still had plenty of time left in the day as a result of the great tail wind. Another 20 miles or so and we would find ourselves back on the bike path we took 42 days ago on the 4th day of our trip. We were still flying, even more now so that we were on the bike path because it was pin straight. As the miles started piling up and we were feeling great, we thought it might just be a good day to make this a century ride. We pedaled through Fremont and remembered the roads to get back to the path. Then it was all familiar territory on the trail for the next 20 miles or so. As we were riding, an older gentleman stopped when he saw Joe, and then turned around and asked if he could ride with us for a little while. We of course said yes as its always nice to have some company. He inquired about our travels, shared how him and his wife had ridden cross country when they were young. He asked how far we were planning to ride today, and we told him we were aiming for a century since we had such a good tail wind all day, so we figured we would stop in Bellevue. He asked where we normally sleep and we explained how we usually camp behind churches or in town parks, or wherever there is a spot where we aren’t going to bother anyone. He proceeded to explain some possible places in town as we continued our ride along the path, appreciating that it wasn’t 98 degrees like it was last time we were on the path! As we approached the road where he would turn off to go to his house, he said we could keep riding, or if we were ok not getting quite to 100 miles, we could join him and have a hot shower and pitch our tent in the back yard. Wow! That offer came out of nowhere! We of course happily accepted, as having permission to be somewhere with our tent is always favorable, and a shower, too! How could we refuse!! As we made our way towards his house a gorgeous sunset in view, he called his wife and told her to come outside and see what he ‘dragged home’. Dale’s wife Linda was elated to see us. They both welcomed us right in and even showed us their super amazing semi-recumbent tandem. Linda asked if we were hungry and offered to whip something up for us if we were, insisted really! So we set up our tent, got settled, enjoyed so much yummy food and had such a lovely time talking with the two of them. We heard so many great stories of their family, grandchildren, and life in this area of Ohio as they have lived here their whole life. Warm showers and full tummies made the end of a big mile day even better, even if we were 4 miles short of a century. Linda even gave me two of the potholders she was knitting to remember her by. We headed to sleep in the quiet backyard surrounded by corn, our legs very tired.
Wow have we been spoiled these past few nights sleeping indoors. We are feeling so great, a welcome feeling after many days on our tour of waking up tired. Paul made some yummy oatmeal topped with fruit for breakfast before we said our goodbyes and were on our way again. As we were leaving, we were happy to see Cathy waving to us as she passed on the way to Paul’s house. While we didn’t have as strong of a tailwind like yesterday, the ride was pretty smooth sailing this morning. Our destination tonight would be Ann Arbor, a place we passed through in 2012, but definitely wanted to go through again because it was such a neat little town. The sun was pretty warm today, making it feel a little slower than normal. We met our fair share of rude drivers as we got close to the highway and had to deal with extra cars on the frontage road as there had been an accident on the highway diverting cars to go around. When we finally got past that, the frontage road felt like a frontage road should- car free. We had seen a Culvers yesterday, so we made a plan to stop at one next time we saw one because we knew it might be the last chance as we kept getting closer to home. We stopped for groceries in Hartland, where a man in a pickup said, “I saw you earlier this morning up near Flushing, wow you guys really move!”. This made us giggle, but chances are it was probably us, because how many loaded down bikes would be near flushing today? After we picked up some groceries, we went seeking a place to eat. On the way, I found a cell phone on the side of the road. Worried it would get run over, I picked it up planning to figure out how to find the owner at lunch. We finally found a picnic table outside a business that was closed today, so we started cooking some lunch, including corn on the cob again since its been so tasty. As I sat there attempting to figure out the owner of the phone, I was pleased to see the person had listed themselves in the emergency option on their phone. I was able to find them on Facebook and message them. No response, however. That was a little frustrating, because I didn’t want to just leave the phone somewhere. As we were eating however, we saw the same small suv drive by multiple times slow. That HAD to be the people looking for their phone!! I jogged out to the road, and sure enough it was! They had used the location finder to locate it, but at least it didn’t get run over. I know if I lost my phone, I’d appreciate if someone picked it up and got it to me, and this young college age girl was undoubtably grateful. Sure made for an interesting lunch break to say the least! We looked up where the next Culvers would be and were pleased to find out that it was on our route. So, after another 10 or so miles, we stopped for some frozen custard!! YUM! The remainder of the ride into Ann Arbor continued on the frontage road for a while until we passed by a lake, where people were clearly not social distancing on the beach. Ominous clouds on the horizon however, kept us pedaling fast in hopes that we wouldn’t get soaked. Before we knew it, we were back on a bike path taking us right into Ann Arbor. The path crossed a little dam and also a small stream with multiple tiny waterfalls that residents were happily tubing down. It looked like a blast!!! If only we had a tube! Going through town was interesting, too, as there were tons of people out. A street that was filled with restaurants was shut down and everyone was eating outside! We were able to ride through even still. Up the hill towards our hosts house for the night and then we were there! Christa and David and their two boys greeted us. The boys cleaned out the playhouse so that we were able to sleep in there on air mattresses!! Another night we didn’t have to worry about our tent, how could we be so lucky!!?? They offered us showers and we ate practically a whole watermelon and a huge bowl of popcorn. It was so great getting to know David and Christa and hear how their small outings with their boys on bicycles have gone. Sleeping in the playhouse sure was fun, especially since there was plenty of rain and thunder from those dark clouds that followed us there. Warm Shower’s saved us again.
Ahhhh… nothing like sleeping in a really comfy bed. We woke up feeling completely refreshed and headed down the hall for the hotels ‘to go’ breakfast since continental breakfasts are a think of the past, at least until the Covid pandemic is over. It sure was nice sleeping without worrying about our tent breaking! Seeing as we are getting to the end of the trip now, thought, we are still hopeful for one or two more Warm Shower’s evenings just so help ensure our tent will make it through as we estimate we will be home in about a week (hard to believe!!). We kind of took our time heading out this morning since it was so comfortable at the hotel, but after a while, finally got on the road. We were pleasantly surprised to find a strong tailwind! It had been a while since we had a consistent tail wind like that! At one point on the way out of town, we stopped at a bike shop and I was very pleased to find a very friendly kitty inside. It had been a while since I had kitty time! The morning miles flew by, so much so that even with our late departure, we still had our average number of miles completed before stopping for lunch. Taco salad was on the menu again, as that’s our new favorite lunch and had some taco sauce, lettuce and tomatoes to use up. While I was getting the extra groceries, Joe looked up a spot for lunch. A bit around the corner, we found a comfortable pavilion at the end of a bike path. The path went in the opposite direction, so we didn’t end up taking it into town. As we were making lunch, a couple, Paul and Cathy, pulled up on their bikes from off the bike path. They got their cooler out of the trunk of their car and came to occupy one of the tables in the pavilion. This of course led to some lovely conversations about the area, bike path, and our travels. They inquired with the usual questions of how many miles a day we do, where we slept at night, and what kind of gear we had. As the conversation continued, Paul did some calculations and mentioned that he lived about the right distance for us to stop for the night and we ended up being invited to stay with them this evening! Before leaving, we exchanged phone numbers and gave him our website so he could track our progress, and that he did! Our afternoon ride continued with a strong tailwind, flat roads, and a few dirt roads (but not packed sand, so that was good!). The ride took us through some quiet country scenery before we arrived in the town of Flushing. Before we knew it, we were pedaling up to Paul’s condo, excited to see them again! We were greeted with much enthusiasm, found out we would enjoy sleeping in a comfy bed, had a shower, and even had pizza and salad for dinner. It was so great to hear about Paul’s ventures with the local school district, his coaching experience, as well as get a tour of his fantastic sports lounge in the basement! Cathy and Paul had so many wonderful stories to share about their family and even some of the volunteer work they do. Oftentimes these unexpected encounters, turn out to be most memorable. I’m so glad we had the chance to meet and get to know Paul and Cathy, not to mention have one less night to worry about our tent falling down!
We woke up bright and early, happy our tent made it through the night, with plans to head off to Midland. But first, we headed back into town to the little park we had dinner at last night. Joe went off to find some milk and we had some of our cereal and enjoyed the view of the lake. A few more hills today before things began to flatten out. We stopped at the grocery store in Gladwin for some food for lunch, then continued on until we found a good spot to eat lunch. That ended up being in the next town. A lovely little park fit with a small water park for kids and our favorite- pavilions greeted us as we pedaled into Beaverton. Joe made lunch while I made a couple of wire bicycles, and made my promised time lapse video for Matt. The road flattened out for the rest of the day all the way until we arrived at the wonderful, fully paved bike path that John, our host for tonight, told us about. The Pere-Marquette Rail-Trail was fantastic. It was nice to be off the road as route 18 had a bit more traffic than we like. As we were riding, we got closer and closer to Sanford, and realized what John was talking about when he said, “there will be a few places we would have to walk our bikes.” We had not made the connection to the dam flooding that happened in May that we saw on the news and that we would be going right through there. Despite it having 10-12 weeks ago, the area was still rebuilding. There was SO much devastation still apparent, including on the bike path. Parts of the path were washed away, there were trees down blocking parts, and even a few bridges that were washed out too. It was nothing like we had ever seen. My heart went out to these people that lost so much. It was quite eye opening! After getting past most of the aftermath, we found our way back on the trail as we had to get off because some sections were not passable. Still in shock, we pedaled along down the smooth trail. It was then, that we saw a man riding towards us, and stop. I knew instantly that it must be John. Joe on the other hand didn’t even notice at first. John greeted us and became our tour guide right into town (it’s always so nice not having to figure out directions and just ride with a local!!) He shared trips of his incredible travels across the country (at record pace!) and took us through sections of the town that had been devastated by the flood. Seeing some of the neighborhoods with beautiful homes all uninhabited now was eerie. We passed by Johns house, and then followed his directions to the hotel that was a mile or two away. Wow! Such a beautiful hotel!! We had showers and cleaned up, so we were ready for John to pick us up to see more of Midland and have some dinner. First stop was the impressive single A baseball stadium, where we met two of Johns friends and had a couple of drinks. We had such a great time talking with John, and his friends Rob and Laurie. Then, off to the brewery we passed on the bike path for some delicious dinner! Joe got his usual- a bacon cheeseburger, however his burger was one-uped as it had a ‘cheese skirt’… which I didn’t even realize existed, but it sure looked good! So much great conversation about bike touring, politics, and the lot as we enjoyed our meal. Hearing stories of other people’s tours is always inspiring, especially since John did so many extremely high mileage days while he was traveling! As usual, it was hard to say goodbye to such an awesome host, and we were of course sad that we didn’t get to meet John’s wife, too. Hopefully someday in “non-covid” times, we will be able to meet again. But on the bright side, we were able to meet John and enjoy some great times with him.
A lovely breakfast of oatmeal with all the fixings set us off on a wonderful start to our day. Our gracious hosts helped us prep and mail a box of license plates to mail home for our collection since we had found so many in the last two weeks before we packed up. Another hard hosts house to leave as we were so comfortable there, but we had to keep on moving to be home in time to get ready for school this year, however it would be- virtual, hybrid, and most likely not “normal.” Our first stop was the hardware store on the way out of town to find another remedy for our broken tent pole. Then we were off heading further into lower Michigan. In the next town, we ended up deciding to change my chain, since it was probably due and there was a bike shop in case the old cassette rejected it. Well, it turns out, it did, and joe had to do a bit more maintenance work than he hoped. We ended up eating lunch, even though we weren’t as many miles in as we usually are because of this. Since I’m a slow eater, Joe was able to go to the bike shop, get the new cassette, and have it all fixed as I leisurely ate and typed away at some blogs. Having to put a new cassette on was the turning point to a flawless morning. After lunch, we followed googles directions out of town, but it seemed to try to take us down something that definitely didn’t look like a road. After much wasted time, we continued on, and took the next road they suggested, although it was packed SAND! Joe didn’t have as much of a problem as I did because I can’t stand the feeling of falling over or uneven ground under my bike, so even after riding (and walking for me) down this road for a half a mile to a mile, we turned back around and went back to the main road, even though it would mean more miles for the day. I’ll take more miles any day as long as I don’t have to try to ride on packed sand again! Finally, after an hour or so of frustrating roads, we were back on track feeling much better. As we were riding down the next roads, I was constantly worried, it would just turn into another one of those sand roads, but luckily, they never did. As we were expressing our frustration, the memory of when we rode through lower Michigan in 2012 came to mind, and now, we were remembering this was a problem then, too. While it seemed forever to get to the next town (the woes of going out to eat and drinking too much pop), we finally made it and took a little break, accepting that since we had so many road blocks this afternoon, that we wouldn’t make the original miles we planned on for the day. I also had a bit of a headache for some reason, so the break did me good. On to the last town of the day, where we would find a camp spot for the night. As we entered town, a beautiful lake came into view on the right, because of course we were in the state with 10000 lakes. We found a nice park by the water to enjoy our leftovers from lunch. We had messaged another warm showers host in Midland, a little more last minute than we normally like to do, but figured it might be best since we weren’t sure how much longer out tent was going to last, now. John replied enthusiastically really, quickly. While his wife has COPD and there was some worry with COVID, he said he still wanted to meet us and give us a place to stay, even if it wasn’t at his house. We were awe struck when he said he would buy us a hotel, and wanted to take us out to dinner, too. We of course told him that he didn’t have to spend that kind of money on us, be he absolutely insisted! The generosity of Warm Shower’s hosts never ceases to amaze me, but getting to meet people who do what you do never gets old, so I can understand where he is coming from. We always enjoy when we can host cyclists from around the world, too! Wow, a hotel to look forward to tomorrow!!! Although the park we ate dinner in looked comfy and had no signs for camping or hours, our best bet always seemed to be churches, so we headed off to find a spot for the tent for the night. The first church we looked into, looked like it would be perfect since there was lots of space and woods behind it, so we won’t bother anyone. The door to the house next-door was open, and we figured it was probably the parsonage. After knocking, we of course found a very kind man, who was indeed the pastor. When we asked to pitch our tent, he told us a story (to make a long story short) of when him and his wife were just starting out in their married life, had not yet settled down and how they were (while not on a bike) setting their tent up in random places. So, the answer was of course yes. He offered if we needed to use the hose for anything we could as well as any outlets on the back of the church in case we needed to charge things. Since we already ate dinner, we were able to relax a little, try to fix our tent again, make another wire bicycle. For the first time ever after leaving a little wire bicycle at a host’s house, I got a message from Matt with extreme interest in learning how to make one! Since they are so fun to make, I tried to explain it and make a time lapsed video. Before the end of the day, he had even bough the small pliers and wire to try it out! So fun to spread the love, like it was spread to me from our German friends on our 2012 tour. We drifted to sleep as soon as it was dark out, excited for another day on the road tomorrow (as long as there were no more packed sand roads!).
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"WRITING IN A JOURNAL EACH DAY ALLOWS YOU TO DIRECT YOUR FOCUS TO WHAT YOU ACCOMPLISHED, WHAT YOU'RE GRATEFUL FOR, AND WHAT YOU ARE COMMITTED TO DOING BETTER TOMORROW. THUS, MORE DEEPLY, YOU ENJOY
YOUR JOURNEY EACH DAY." -HAL ELROD
AuthorMost, if not all blog posts will be written by Emmalee, as we each have our designated jobs while on tour to keep things running smoothly. TO SUM IT UP:
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