Written by Dave

Day 60-61 – July 27-28 – 69 Miles, 1,900 feet climbing (Ludington, MI to Evart)

I’m sure that many readers will be glad to hear that the rumors of Chris’s untimely demise have been greatly exaggerated. After a strong rest day yesterday, today he rose again to tackle the road to Evart, Michigan. This morning he put his energy level at 80% but still managed to ride a solid 69 miles today. There’s no stopping the Chris Crossing train before Maine. Right mate?

Other than Chris resting and Nancy planning the route ahead, not much exciting happened on our rest day yesterday. We had brekkie with Laura in town and used her car for a few errands before she left for the airport. It was fun having her out on the road with us, though I think both her and her Dad would have preferred that he not have his current case of the Delhi Belly. Thanks for all the driving Laura – it was nice not having panniers on the bikes for a few days.

Speaking of panniers, we rode today fully loaded and the bikes were heavy. Not any heavier than when we started in Oregon but heavy after three days of riding bag free. We felt pretty sluggish on the first few hills and probably took 10 miles for everyone to get fully used to the loaded bikes once again.

The scenery today was nice for the first 10 miles. This time we had rolling farm and orchard lands mixed in amongst a nice wind farm. There was a good breeze from the south and we were riding south and south-east for a while but mostly the tall corn and orchards blocked the wind at street level. At turbine height there was a good breeze as the turbines were moving at a good clip. I for one like the sound of a moving turbine. To me it’s the sound of mankind getting electricity without burning carbon – well done Michigan.

Renewable energy is not easy in Michigan. I don’t think they have much geothermal potential and many of their rivers have limited hydro producing drops. As such, 92% of the power here comes from coal, natural gas and nuclear. The 8% that comes from wind is not huge but at least they are trying.

We had quiet back roads riding for most of the morning until we reached Baldwin where we stopped for morning tea. The servo we stopped at was rough, full of a good variety of hard looking folks. Not many of the cars in the car park were rust free and had all their windows and one had to wonder how well they were being maintained. As such, we were happy to hop on the Pere Marquette Rail Trail just on the edge of town.

We stayed on the trail for about 5 miles until we tired of the slow crushed (and sometimes loose) gravel. After that, we hopped back out onto state highway 10. There was a good amount of traffic but the shoulder was adequate and most drivers pulled into the far lane (when they could). We stayed on 10 until the town of Reed City where increasing traffic levels drove us back onto the bike path. It was good timing as the last 15 miles of the path from there were sealed asphalt. We took this path all the way into Evart, our home for the night.

We stopped at The Lamplighter Cafe for a feed. The food was ok, good value for money at least. Nancy and I had brekkie again and Chris had a double patty ½ pound hamburger. Both Nancy and I were happy to see Chris eating. Maybe tomorrow he’ll reach 90% man status.

We are camping at the Riverside Campground. It’s not fancy but it will do for a night. We booked sight 6 but it was too sunny so we checked online and moved ourselves to empty side 14. The camp host came out to see what we were doing and inform us that 14 was actually booked, but that the people who were here had left early. I looked online and it didn’t seem to be booked. Lots of back and forth, mixed with some nice storytelling and Cheryl the host told us just to stay in 14 and she’d sort out what happens if the folks who booked 14 actually came back. It’s nearly 5PM so we are feeling pretty safe that we won’t have to move.

There’s some rain in the forecast, 8% on some services, 30% on others. We are going with the 8% because we know that it means a 92% chance of dry weather. I’m not sure that “hoping it stays dry” has any impact but there you go. More rain is forecast for tomorrow but the percentages are also low. We are moving onwards to Midland and a hotel. We didn’t book the hotel because we anticipated the LWOP Wet Foot rule would need invoking, more because Midland is pretty big and camping was way out of town. It’s shorter day with a lot of downhill. Had Chris felt better, I’d try to convince him that we could call it an active rest day. Maybe I’ll try that after we reach Midland…