Lake Superior

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Land, lake and storm on Lake Michigan

Day 18- 105 miles

Rode strong today on mostly flat secondary roads. The wind was favorable for most of the ride. Got to my destination of Paradise of 75 miles but the legs and heart said let's keep going! Road along the shore most of the afternoon and pulled into Bay View Campground around 6:00pm. Currently I'm about 20 miles west of Sault St. Marie , my starting point of the ride. Tomorrow once I hit Mackinac Trail I'll turn south to St Ignace. There my brother-in-law will meet me for many beers and any other trouble be can find.

The campground tonight is the best one of the entire trip. Although there are no showers, Lake Superior is at the foot of my tent! With road grime and salt caked to my body after the long miles and sun, I plunged into the water and enjoyed a reasonably warm lake and 2 ft surf. Ahhh feel like a new man.

Since I'm pretty much done with the ride here are some facts of the ride:

Total days riding 17 plus 1 rest day.
Total miles 1,360 (average 80 mi/day
Camped 14 out of 18 days
Motel for 4 days
Two - 1/2 days of rain
Ate 30 packages of Quaker Oats
Drank 16 cups of coffee at camp
Average beers per night 2 - I think?!
Ice cream/ Blizzards -6
Power bars - 16
Calories burned per day 4,500
Burned 22 oz of stove fuel
1 worn out tire and zero flats
Times had to get up a pee at night- 2
Bear and moose sighting - 0 (bummer)
Best moment - talking in camp at night
Worst moment - Wally's World (Eagle Adventures)

Jeff Reaves
Sent from my iPhone

Friday, August 19, 2011

Grand Sable sand dunes

Loggers had dry flumes along these cliffs to get the logs into the lake for transport. Log would go from top to bottom in less than 10 seconds.

Day 17 - 55 miles of rain

Today's ride to Grand Marais was fairly flat along the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. Only downer was the thunder storms that rolled through all- day. It's hard to outrun a storm! But I tried. Found a great pub in GM which has roots in Oregon. The Lake Superior Brewing Company's owners also live outside of Eugene, OR on a
vineyard and are promoting their wine in the UP. The name is Sarver Winery.

Grand Marais has a nice harbor and is the jump-off point for those hiking the Nat'l Lakeshore. This area had a very large Pinery and huge log rafts use to line the shores. In the winter this area is snowmobile central!

Jeff Reaves
Sent from my iPhone

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Day 16 - day of rest

No bike riding today! Traded the bike for a kayak. The plan was to paddle to Pictured Rocks but the winds had created 2 to 4 ft surf at the shore which made approaching the sandstone cliffs too dangerous. With a group of 20 other kayakers we crossed the channel to Grand Island, where the waters were protected. The shoreline was full of sandstone caves and cliffs of 40 to 60 ft. All and all a great day. After 6 hours of paddling had to take a long deserved dip in the lake!