by Jeff

32 miles

Once the bike was fixed, it was time to get back on the road! Our destination: Honor, Michigan, to visit some old friends who used to live in Marquette, Tom and Jonnine Rumney. Hey, it’s only 32 miles, right?  Not a problem!

After regathering at the laundromat, then eating a quick lunch, we finally started weaving our way through the town of Traverse City at around 2:00. We biked through the Cherry Festival along the Traverse Area Recreation Trail (TART), a fully paved bikeway that was just awesome. Like I said before, Traverse City is a great place for recreation! Because of the Cherry Festival, there were rides, booths, games, and all kinds of activity downtown. We didn’t have time to stop, unfortunately, but it was really cool to see.

Then, it was time to leave town. Okay, one thing we didn’t realize is that Traverse City is kind of located in a bowl. Meaning: leaving town, going west, there’s no way but up. Cedar Run Road will forever be burned in our minds as the road that nearly killed us. For three miles, we did nothing but climb. Well, we did a few other things, like gasping for breath, mild cursing, standing around, and walking our bikes, but overall, it was misery. Maybe we could have done it alright without pulling heavy trailers, but all of the weight we were pulling made our quads burn like crazy. What a momentum killer–we still had almost 30 miles to go.

Finally, the climbing came to an end. And, the nice thing is that what goes up, must come down. The rest of the ride was mostly flat, or downhill. Hooray! Our spirits lifted, and we began to gain more confidence.

Then came the rain. It rained while we were at the bike shop/laundromat, but then it stopped. We thought, perhaps we’re in the clear! Yeah, not so much. About halfway to the Sleeping Bear Dunes, the clouds got really dark.  I began to wonder which of the nice family farms we were passing might take us in. Literally, while thinking those thoughts, we came upon a significant downhill–and the raindrops began to fall. In 15 seconds, it was a DELUGE. Rain was pelting us, hitting our faces and making it difficult to see – it even took our breath away. We were going fast, downhill, in buckets of rain, and I kept thinking about wet, slippery brakes, imagining a train wreck at the bottom of the hill (Lots of praying, again!). Miraculously, we all made it down safely, and took cover in a random driveway under some trees. We were drenched. David was whimpering a little, as was Caleb. I was like, C’mon, buck up, we’ll make it through this!  Hmm, empathy? Not one of my strengths.

Then we heard a shout: the property owners were at the door and they called us to come inside. Sweet mercy! We filed in, took off our shoes, and that’s how we met Kelly and Gary. So grateful for the kindness of strangers–the hospitality we have experienced on this trip has blown us all away! We got to know them a little, and within 30 minutes, the rain had stopped, so we started to make our way again.

Just as we were to remount our bikes, our friends Dave and Sharon Buck surprised us by stopping by! They tracked us down to make sure we survived the storm, and offered to take pictures of us as we rode along. What sweet people!  Thanks to them, you can see how we’re set up on our bikes:

Everybody is shown here except for Cora, who is on her own road bike, with no trailer. (Lucky!)

As we continued to the Sleeping Bear Dunes, Google maps, which usually does a great job of showing the best bike routes, brought us to a dirt road. Yes, it might be the shortest route, but from experience, dirt roads are a slow, painful way for us to go. Moments after we arrived at the intersection, and as we were looking at alternative routes, a car drove up. It turned out to be two women, going out to eat on this Friday night. The passenger, Cathy, leaned out of the window, and the following conversation took place:

Cathy: “Are you lost? Can I help you?”

Us: “Actually, we are trying to figure out if we have to take this road, or can go around”

Cathy: “You don’t want that road! It is up and down the whole way for 2 miles.  You’ll be walking most of it. Where are you going?”

Us: “Honor.”

Cathy: “What?!? That’s another 15 miles! Are you crazy? I have a truck, we’ll go get it.  You can put all your **** in the back and we’ll take you there.”

The Driver: “yeah, I can fit three people in here”

Us: “Wow, that’s really kind!  We’ll be okay, we just need a way to get back to a paved road to Honor.”

—- the conversation continued with Cathy and her friend reluctantly giving us the navigational information while trying to convince us to give up on biking and take the ride instead.  They were concerned that the weather would turn again, or that some other other catastrophe might befall us. We learned that Cathy is a retired teacher: “I’m just concerned about the kids…” They only let us continue on our way after Cathy gave us her cell phone number and extracted a promise to call for help if anything happened.

We took Cathy’s detour, adding just a couple of miles to our journey, and passed through some incredibly beautiful country. The forests and water around Sleeping Bear Dunes are very scenic, and did I mention that we were still going downhill? During the last 10 miles of our ride, we were practically giddy, enjoying the ride, racing each other, and clipping along at a great pace. One mile from our destination, we saw a car pull over: it was our host, Tom! He was a little concerned, and then assured us that pizza was on its way. To add more motivation for us, he said the last person to arrive wouldn’t get any pizza. Okay, we knew it was a joke, but still… you should’ve seen Lydia pedal during that last stretch!

Our stay with the Rumney’s was amazingly refreshing. Papa J’s pizza, (in Honor), is seriously some of the best pizza ini Michigan. We ate a lot. Tom and Jonnine’s son Dave was there as well, and Dave’s wife Kelly was my classmate in high school. It was so great to see them and spend time catching up. The Rumney’s live on Big Platte Lake, an ideal swimming lake for our kids – the water was about 3-4 feet deep for about 50 yards from shore. Another highlight for our kids: they had dogs. And my kids love dogs. The dogs probably didn’t get a moment’s peace the entire evening, but I didn’t see them complaining. Bellies full, bodies washed, we all slept great that night on mattresses.

Puppy love

Tomorrow: We head south!