My Labor Day Weekend Tour with pics

Triathlon Forum
1

So I am finally getting this posted. Spent 4 days cruising around michigan, no real set plans I chose my next destination the night before each day. Started out from my house in Saginaw to Clare MI mostly on the Pere Marquette rail trail.

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Sorry for the pic size posting from work and can’t resize. This is getting the rig ready to go

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Rest Stop on the trail

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Lunch stop

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Couldn’t find a campground that wasn’t full so I decided to stay at the historic Doherty Inn in Clare. They let me put the buke in a small private dining room with a locking door.

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Next day started out beautiful, that was soon to change as some hasty route selection on my part took me on to gravel roads.

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This area had a lot of Amish farmers selling crafts road side. I also learned to watch for Horse droppings on hte road after almost hitting a fresh pie at 20 miles an hour. I don’t want to think about how that would have ended.

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A beautiful lake in Beaverton MI, I stopped here for lunch. Good thing I fueled up.

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This is looking back down 3 miles of soft sand and gravel fire road that I pushed the bike and loaded trailer up after i got stubborn and decided not to turn around on until it was too late to matter. I was exhausted when i finished this and my planned campsite was still 20 miles away.

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This is looking up the road at my new route, much better pedaling despite more traffic. I found signs for a campground not on my map 2 miles later and made an executive decision. 8 miles of some very nice riding and I was pitching the tent.

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Not the greatest campsite but it worked.

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Very beautiful beginning to my ride this morning

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There was some sort of rule that every vehicle must have a hang tag in the park, after looking confused for a moment, the girl filled mine out as above.

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Stopped in town and grabbed me a cold beverage and just relaxed the rest of the day. Spent part of it down by the river which is a popular tubing and canoing river, watching the groups of drunken revelers go by and swapping bits of conversation as the current carried them past. This resulted in two beers and numerous comments on my “farmers tan”. All in all a good trip and I was very disappointed to pedal home the next day. I got home and the trip meter said 200.12 miles for the 4 days.

2

Thanks for sharing. I got to try one of these bike trips around here.

And yea right about the couldn’t find a campsite and having to stay at the inn instead :wink:

3

looks like a great trip!. Any idea what the trailer weighed when loaded up?. Any big climbs that you had a problem getting up because of the extra weight?.

4

AWESOME! So very cool. I love that trailer.

5

Very cool. Thanks for sharing. One of my best vacations was doing the Bike Ride Across Georgia when we rode from Atlanta to Savannah over the course of a week. What a blast!

6

It was labor day weekend and also the town I was near had an Antiques Fest going on, so no there was no available campsites, I would have preferrred to camp. However the hotel had a bar with Harp on tap :slight_smile: so it evened out.

I guesstimated the trailer and gear at about 40lbs total. Seemed to drop my speed about 2-3 miles an hour on the first day when i was fresh and on good pavement. As for hills it is pretty flat around here but was a little hillier farther north, nothing to make me get out of the saddle but the drag was noticeable but not debilitating.

7

I like that last pic with the 24 oz. Budweiser. That’s my favorite post-training recovery drink.

8

I like the one of the green tent with the bike right next to it :slight_smile:
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9

Very Very Cool! I love the pic with the vehicle tag on the bike that needs a frame!

How does the bike handle with the trailer?

Thanks for sharing!

Peace,
RF

10

Looks like fun. How many miles?

11

Bike handles ok with the trailer, my old fuji touring does better, but the fuji is due for a rebuild this winter and i didn’t trust it for this trip.

Distance was 200.12 miles from my door to my door, big loop route.

12

Nice trip jim. you sure had a great weekend for all that pedaling.