Up Early to Enter the Upper Peninsula

Our hotel in Marinette was right next to the bridge that leads to Michigan. Within a few minutes pedaling we were out of Wisconsin and into Michigan. Woo-hoo! We entered the town of Menominee, which is really just fun to say! Bruce now exclaims “Holy Menominee!” when we see a stunning sight.

We were dreading this day as the bulk of the day’s cycling would be on Michigan 35. The route book indicated it wasn’t too bad, with a good shoulder, but we were skeptical. It started off fine, with a separated bike path, but soon we were on the shoulder. The traffic was fairly constant, fast,and loud! We had some beautiful scenery, but it’s difficult to notice when you’re in traffic. Trucks would scream by, hitting the center rumble strip to give us a wider berth. It was courteous but deafening. Bruce finally wore an earplug in the ear facing traffic.

As we were climbing a hill, Kelley noticed she was losing momentum, and control. Ugh, our first flat! On this busy highway! Fortunately we were able to change it at the end of someone’s driveway without incident. Of course it’s the back tire, which is the hardest to change in good conditions, but with all the gear on the back it’s even more challenging. Bruce was able to change it without taking the bags off. Yay! Before he finished, it started raining. We hurriedly got on our jackets and covered our bags with the waterproof bags. We were back on the road in good time. The rain became harder.

The rain continued for a while, but abated just as we came to a boat ramp with a picnic table. We stopped to eat our lunch. A father and son were doing some fishing from the shore. He, like most everyone we met, was curious about our trip. He said he had ridden his bike around the lake as well~ his motorcycle!

Soon the rain was back~ and coming down incredibly hard. The fisherman left in a hurry and we were left getting soaked. The only shelter was a vault toilet. We took refuge in there, but left the door open for some fresh air! When the rain lessened, we took off to complete our day’s journey to Escanaba.

We had sent a re-supply box to our lodging in Escanaba. While we were glad to have provisions to see us to the end of the journey, we were not thrilled to load up our bikes again! The hotel had a restaurant, so we opted to eat there due to the rain. When we told our server about our journey she told us about a local resident, Peter Frank, a legendary young adventurer who was canoeing the Grand Aquatic Loop backwards. He has a live tracker, and when we looked it up he was in Kentucky. How ironic!

After dinner the rain had ended, so we walked the town. For a Saturday night it was eerily quiet. We found an open sports bar and stopped in for a drink. Everyone was watching the Packers game. At first we thought it was a replay, but then realized that it was only yesterday that we were at Lambeau Field. Soon we had struck up a conversation with two guys at the end of the bar. Allen and Jeremy made the evening extra fun! Turns out the bartender, JoHannah, is the sister of Peter Frank.

The next day we loaded all our new provisions on our bikes and headed out. The route book had us on busy US 2, which is also US Bike Route 10 all day. We did NOT want to do that! It is faster and busier than US 35, so we googled and found an alternate route. We were thrilled to be missing the zooming .cars.

The thing about Google bicycle directions is that it doesn’t take into consideration the kind of bike you have, and if and how much gear you might be carrying. Soon we made a turn onto a gravel road and entered the Hiawatha Forest. We thought it was a short ride on the gravel road. Each direction on google would say turn right on such and such road, etc. But the roads were just a continuation of the rough, thick gravel trail. We did about 15 miles before we came to an actual road. We were swarmed by black flies and bitten relentlessly, as well as losing control and fish-tailing with the heavy bikes several times. Google had us continuing through the woods, and although it was amazing scenery, we opted to ride towards US 2 and finish the final miles with the traffic. It was grim.

Our destination was Historic Fayette State Park. It was 18 miles down Michigan 183. A hilly, beautiful ride. We had a major headwind the entire way, so it was slow going. With the hills and strong headwind we were lucky to go 6 mph on some parts, and we were tired. We finally got to the park and set up camp. We had friendly neighbors who offered us S’mores after dinner! We gladly took them up on their offer!

Saturday Cycling: 57 miles

Hiking: 4 miles

Sunday Cycling: 64.5 miles

Hiking: 2 miles