Michigan 26 Day 1 - Michigamme to Christmas

It's time to say goodbye to beautiful Lake Michigamme.

And my brother-in-law Steve's family lake house compound

And get on my bike and ride home.

 It's about 1100 miles. It should take about three weeks.

I got going early this morning, and since it was easy riding and perfect weather, I did 74 miles, and was done by 3:00 pm. I was planning on doing 68 miles and camping, but I got to the campground at 2:00, there is no restaurant nearby, and it's $84 dollars for a tent site with no electricity.

So I decided to ride on for another hour or so to get here to Christmas, Michigan, which is highly beloved by Steve's family, and my sister Amy says the Foggy's steak house in town is a winner. 

And, what do you know, there is a motel with rooms available across the street from Foggy's. The downside is the motel is $200, which turns out is the cheapest room available anywhere nearby. There is primitive camping across the street, but my phone was dead, and I want a shower. 

This is the second year I've come up here. I've learned there are time honored rituals. One of them is that one evening will will eat take-out pasties from this place:

A "pasty" is a lump of fried dough with meat and rutabagas inside it. This is the traditional lunch of iron ore miners. You can also get them hot and ready to eat at the grocery, next to the rotisserie chickens. "Pasty" sounds like "past". It does not rhyme with "tasty". They are better than you think.

Another ritual is to go visit "Da Yoopers Tourist Trap and Rock Shop". This is like a small-scale, stupider and crappier Wall Drug or South of the Border. I got a sweatshirt because the nights are in the 50s now, and I didn't bring a warm shirt. 

 

They also have a rock shop with many cool rocks because the Upper Peninsula is the home of cool rocks. There were some big chunks of multi-colored diorite that would look absolutely amazing in the aquarium I am setting up. Debra flat out refused to carry any big heavy rocks on her flight home. I am sad. I will return with my pickup truck someday.

These fine establishments are in the town of Ishpeming, which has no known pronunciation.

I rode Route 41 for 20 miles to Ishpeming, which is a 4 lane road, but it has huge wide shoulders, not much traffic, and it's scenic. At least until Ishpeming, that is. I went on city streets in Ishpeming, and discovered that there is a fantastic bike trail that goes another 20 miles to Marquette, the Iron Ore Heritage Trail. It's a rail trail, it's fabulous.

Sometimes it's paved, sometimes it's not, but even when it isn't paved, it's fast, smooth, comfortable crushed stone.

Mining iron ore is part of the heritage here, but it's also still ongoing. I got to share the road with some pretty huge ore trucks (24 wheels!) before I found the rail trail. I also came upon what looks like an operating mine.

I took the trail all the way to the ore dock on the shore of Lake Superior in Marquette.

The trail continues about 5 more miles to the town of Harvey, where I had some disappointing and greasy pan-fried perch at this barbeque place.

It was 34 more miles to Christmas, where my present was a huge fancy room at this expensive hotel, which also has a really awesome hot tub, by the way.

After I soaked in the hot tub, and had a shower, and a nice nap, I went across the street and gorged myself on this lovely slab of beef.

This was a good call, Amy.

Here's the Strava track:
https://www.strava.com/activities/19504610386

Over The Top Tour Day 4 - Abingdon to Home

 The quick tour from the beach to home, going over the top of the Chesapeake Bay, was a success.

Here is the only picture I could take:

This is me testing that my phone still works after I drove back and found it where I dropped it a mile from the start of the ride. The phone has been run over, the screen is all cracked, but it still works.

The ride today was very old school, what with no phone. No checking the map for where to eat, no texting Jim to see where he is, just riding.

What lead to this mess was the rain. The forecast said rain in the morning until around 1:00. This was no big deal since we only had to go 40 miles or so. We hang out in the motel until checkout at noon or so, then have lunch nearby, then start riding when the rain stops. 

But at 10:30, the forecast changed to light rain until 1,  then heavier rain from 1:00 to 2:00. So we decided to set out at 10:30, and stop for lunch when the heavy rain came. 

I didn't bring rain gear, just a jacket that is not water repellent, so I was big on staying dry. Instead of riding at Jim's very comfortable pace, I took off faster to get as far as I could while it wasn't raining much. Jim had rain gear. 

There are not a lot of good options to get into Baltimore from the northeast. The recommended bike route is Route 40, the Pulaski Highway. Route 40 has a big, wide shoulder and it's direct, but other than that it's really horrible, with heavy traffic, lots of trucks, and it's generally ugly. I had a plan to avoid 40 as much as possible by meandering around on back roads, but due to the weather, we decided to just ride 40. 

I realized I had dropped my phone about 5 hilly, rainy miles from the start.

So I have no phone, I'm way ahead of Jim, and the expected heavy rain at 1:00 never actually comes. By 2:00 I'm at Rossville Road, which is just before the Baltimore beltway, and 40 gets really ugly inside the beltway. A much better route is to take Rossville to Mace Ave. to Essex, then come in on Eastern Ave. Which is by no means a nice ride, but way better than 40. 

So I lean my bike on the traffic light pole at Rossville, sit and make myself comfortable and wait for Jim to catch up. Fifteen minutes or so later, he does, and he rides right by. He doesn't hear me yelling because he's listening to books on tape and the heavy traffic noise.

By the time I catch him, we decide we might as well continue on 40 because it gives us an opportunity to visit Chap's Pit Beef for lunch. We will make lemonade from the Route 40 lemons.

Chap's is very famous and is generally recognized as the best pit beef place in Baltimore, which really means in the world because pit beef is a Baltimore thing. Despite its location on horrible Route 40, which is full of heavy industry, sleazy motels, liquor stores, payday loans, tattoo parlors and used tire stores. Chap's literally shares a parking lot with an ALL NUDE strip club. Location location location. The inside of Chap's has all the glamour of the outside environs.

And after having an amazing pit beef sandwich at Chap's, I can confirm that it is EXACTLY THE SAME as the most frou-frou Southern California Tri-Tip Sandwich. Except for toppings, but the Chap's fixin's counter has every sauce known to man, so you can exactly replicate the fancy-pants Tri-Tip if you want, instead of the classic Tiger Sauce, thin-sliced onions, and pickles.

Ten blocks later, we are in my old Southeast Baltimore neighborhood and the rest of the ride was my old commute route. And there was no more rain.

Here's the Strava track: https://www.strava.com/activities/18404492921

Over The Top Tour Day 3 - Middletown to Abingdon

 It was a nice 50 mile ride yesterday. We are back in Maryland.

It's interesting how different things look in Maryland compared to Delaware. This is in the small town of North East, which, not surprisingly, is in the northeast corner of the state. No more swamps. Gentle, rolling hills instead of flat. No more chicken houses and fields of chicken food. More and different trees.

We had lunch in this nice pizza place in North East.

Just after North East, we discovered we have a very big obstacle to overcome.

This is the end of the Hatem Bridge, which takes US 40 over the very, very wide Susquehanna River. It's legal to ride your bike across it, but it's no fun at all, and there is no shoulder. Except it's not legal if there is a lane closure for construction. And that would be the case.

The nearest alternative crossing of the Susquehanna is Route 1 over the Conowingo Dam, which is 30 very hilly miles out of the way.

So we had a seat at the weigh station right before the bridge and got busy with Lyft and Uber. Prices vary dynamically and dramatically between $21 and $75. But regardless of what the price is, nobody will take our fare!. After about 40 minutes of failure, my phone battery is nearly dead, so we decided to ride back up the road a half mile to a Dunkin Donuts so I can charge my phone and we can reconsider our options. Maybe the ride sharing drivers think it's sketchy to pick people up at the weigh station? 

Jim is tossing out ideas like maybe renting a van from Enterprise and having them deliver it to us so we can drive ourselves across. One thing for sure is we are not riding up to the Conowingo Dam.

So at Dunkin, I got Uber to find us a driver, but he said he wouldn't carry bikes. So despite immediately cancelling, I had to pay $7. With Lyft, you can put a note in your request that you have bikes. Big win here for Lyft over Uber.

After another half hour of trying and failing, Jim declares we should just ride over the bridge anyway. 

I gave Lyft one last try, and a driver accepted the job! And it was only $21! We were so happy, we both tipped her $20. 

Now I realize that when I was gouged for $150 to cross the Bay Bridge a few days ago, I should have cancelled and tried again for a half hour or so to see if the cost would come down. 

Next time I try to do this ride, I think the plan would be to make an overnight stop at the end of the bridge and reserve the ride share the night before crossing in the morning.

The Hatem Bridge fiasco cost us an hour and a half, but we finally made it to our end point at around 6:00.

We are at the Country Inn and Suites, which is between Abingdon and Aberdeen. Call it Abingdon. This place is the best lodging deal so far on the trip. It's new, clean, spacious, and includes a decent breakfast, all for $100.

It's also a short walk from food.

And we are within the Radius of Baltimore Bar Food Influence. Which means Natty Boh, Buffalo wings, nachos, steamed shrimp with Old Bay, and lots of crab things.

We are almost home.

Here are the Strava tracks.

Part 1 - Middletown to Perryville: https://www.strava.com/activities/18389682357/overview

Part 2 - Backtracking to Dunkin: https://www.strava.com/activities/18390512732

Part 3 - Havre de Grace to Abingdon: https://www.strava.com/activities/18391527052

Over The Top Tour Day 2 - Milford to Middletown

 It was a nice day of riding through scenic farm land and marshes to Middletown. We are staying at a fancy Holiday Inn Express, because Jim stays at these all the time for his job and he gets loyalty points.

Middletown is a city I never knew existed until we started planning the route for this trip. It's actually pretty big and new, with a nice historic core. And there are lots of fancy stores. So there are obviously people with lots of money living here. I just can't figure out why. But it means we have nice lodging options with lots of food nearby, but we have to ride through five miles of Strip Mall Hell and heavy traffic.

We had dinner next door at the Crooked Hammock Brewery, which is this brightly colored places giving off a day care vibe.

Crooked Hammock is a small, growing chain in beach towns. It's very corporate. Nobody there knows why Middletown exists.

Most of the day was fabulous rural countryside, with lots of farms and marshes when we were near the Delaware Bay. The terrain is totally flat.

We started out at this nice old school diner next to our Rodeway Inn. 

There are some tiny towns scattered among the farms. This is the Town Hall in Magnolia, population 235.

We spent most of the day riding up State Route 9, which is the easternmost north-south road in Delaware. But to get there we had to cross the St. Jones River south of Dover. The only option is State Route 1, which is a limited access freeway. Is that legal? Hard telling. Strava won't plan a route over it, but there are no signs saying NO BIKES, and the Strava Global Heatmap shows some people ride it. It was definitely not fun.

After that, we skirted the south side of Dover Air Force Base, past the Air Mobility Command Museum.

Dover AFB is where giant cargo planes are based. It's also where dead soldiers are shipped back to the USA.

The next location of note was Leipsic. I've been to Leipsic before. Back around 1990, I was driving around Delaware watching birds one morning, and I drove over that low bridge in the picture below. I pulled over and stopped where that pickup truck is parked. A policeman, who was parked across the street, walked over and handed me a ticket for going 45 in a 25 zone. 

"How am I doing 45 in a 25 zone when I AM PARKED?" I asked, totally outraged. 

"I have you on radar going 45."

This is a speed trap. When you go over the bridge, the speed limit is 40, but it lowers to 25 right before town. The cop records your speed going over the bridge, and then says you were in the 25 zone.

I have hated Delaware "The Shitty Little State" generally and Leipsic in particular ever since.

Leipsic, however, has the only restaurant for lunch on our route for 15 miles in any direction.

Unfortunately, this only lunch option is called "Sambo's Tavern".

Jim says you can only get away with that when you are far from any civilization. 

Despite the name, it's a nice place, and it has a great view out the back window.

They also sell T-Shirts, which are very nice. They the Sambo's logo which features a big black Labrador Retriever, who presumably is "Sambo".

Jim: "Those are nice shirts, but I don't want to get one because I'd get beat up."

me: "Saying the dog is named "Sambo" probably won't help."

Jim: "Probably not."

I had tasty fried oysters.

We had tailwinds and crosswinds most of the day, but the last part was into a headwind. Here is a picture of Jim I took while waiting for him to catchup. 

I love recumbents.

Here's the Strava track.

https://www.strava.com/activities/18376869641

Over The Top Tour Day 1 - Rehoboth Beach to Milford

 We are at Milford, Delaware, in the relatively decent Rodeway Inn. 

The room is spacious and recently updated, except for.the mold in the bathtub. It doesn't smell too much like cigarette smoke. There is coffee in the lobby. There are only 5 cars in the parking lot at 7:00 am.

But I saw a new one in sketchy motel behavior. When I checked in, the guy at the desk shuffled through a stack of room cards until he found one with my room number. He gave me the old one instead of burning me.a new one. This means that a previous guest in this room who kept their room card could come back any time and use it to enter the room.

Today was a short day and a long day. It was only 39 miles, but it took nearly 6 hours. This was because we had to ride into a strong headwind all day. No big deal for me on the recumbent, which offers very little wind resistance, but Jim is riding an upright touring bike, which has him in an upright position, and he is really held back by the wind. So I'm letting him set the pace, casually coasting along, barely working, heart rate under 90, while he is working very very hard. Recumbents are great.

The only interesting sight today was at the turn onto Holly Tree Road.

There is a holly tree on the corner. Go figure.

The scenery is farm fields rapidly being turned into housing developments. Which are still near plenty of chicken houses. I forsee conflict.

Lunch was gas station chicken at the Quick Stop in Milton. It was amazing. I swear you can't go wrong with gas station chicken on the Eastern Shore. Milton is the home of the Dogfish Head Brewery, which we did not visit, even though Dogfish is an old favorite.

Dinner was across the street at the Surf and Turf Lounge, in the Wal-Mart parking lot. It was really good, nice Bloody Marys to replenish electrolytes (not that I sweated today) and tasty steak.

Here is the Strava track: https://www.strava.com/activities/18365034548

Over The Top Tour Day 0 - Home to Rehoboth Beach

 My friend Jim and I are doing a quick bike tour. We are riding home from Rehoboth Beach by going over the top of the Chesapeake Bay.

Since Jim was already at Rehoboth, I had to get here. So I rode my bike. 107 miles. It was great. Flat easy cruising, with a tailwind much of the way. I left at 8:00 and got in before 6.

Here I am at my motel, still feeling fresh and strong.

This motel is in a great location, a block of the main drag, and it has a room available and no two-day minimum stay. It's not fancy *and* not cheap. 

No, it does not have coffee, which is why I had to walk over to Dunkin Donuts first thing in the morning.

There are lots of interesting local cafes, but none of them are open at 7:00 am. So it's Dunkin. 

I was on a mission on the ride, so I didn't take any pictures. 

Lunch was some Royal Fried in Queen Anne, which hit the spot.

The big first-time highlight experience was taking Lyft to get across the Bay Bridge. I've used Lyft before to get places with a bike, you order an XXL vehicle, which is typically a Toyota Sienna minivan. Bikes fit in no problem, you fold down the second and third row seats on one side. Lyft XXL drivers are used to this. 

I wasn't sure if you can use Lyft to get across the Bay Bridge, so a few days before, I did a test reservation, it's no problem, and they said it would cost $64. Which is mighty expensive, but OK.

So when I got to the end of the Bay Bridge for real, I ordered up a Lyft XXL. It was $140. HOLY CRAP. It's a seven mile ride. I did this anyway. 

I've always used Lyft instead of Uber, because I have never been able to get payments to work with Uber. It's time to make Uber an option. Demand pricing is evil.

Here are the Strava tracks.

Home to the Bay Bridge: https://www.strava.com/activities/18347023646

Bay Bridge to Rehoboth Beach: https://www.strava.com/activities/18351751646

California Cushion Day and Recap

 Today is a cushion day, where I have nothing to do except pack the bike in a box to fly home tomorrow.

This used to be stressful and complicated before the days of Lyft and Uber. You'd have to get a cab to the airport, hope the cab shows up, and hope the bike box will fit in the cab. After Jim and I actually missed a flight because of cab chaos, Jim would always rent a minivan. on the day before we would fly out. Then we would drive to the bike shop to get boxes, and then drive to the airport with the bikes, which we would unload and I would watch them while Jim would return the rental minivan.

Today I just rode 3 1/2 miles to the bike shop on a beautiful morning, with a quick stop at Home Depot for packing tape.

One I have the bike box, I called Lyft for an XXL minivan, which arrived promptly and returned me, bike, and box to the hostel with no stress or fuss.

I had all afternoon to ride down to the beach at Ocean Beach.

Where I stuffed myself with seafood and tropical cocktails. Round 1 was cerviche and a Prickly Pear Mojito.

Round 2 was some calamari and a painkiller.

Then I rode back to the hotel and had a nice nap on the hammock.

In the late afternoon, I put the bike in the box. So easy.

Once the bike was all boxed up, I went over the the Zoomer girl working the registration desk.
me (deadpan): "My bike is packed, it's ready to go."
me: "It's standing here outside the door."
Girl: <blank look>
me: "Is that a good place for me leave it overnight?"
Girl: < checks security cameras> "yes"

My Lyft XXL minivan will be here at 8:00 AM tomorrow to take me 4 miles to the airport. My flight leaves at 11:30. The TSA lines are reported to be 30-45 minutes mid day, when the airport is not very busy.

The final numbers on this trip are about 850 miles of riding over 17 days, with 2 days off. About 150 of those miles were on the shoulders of interstates!

Lodging and eating out is very expensive here. I wound up spending about $150/day on the average, and that is with being very economical on the lodging by camping and staying in hostels (or AirBnB rooms in a shared house that function like a hostel). But this is worth it. Southern California is a very unique and memorable place to go on a  bike tour.

The lodging breakdown:
6 nights budget motels
3 nights camping
4 nights AirBnB (all bedrooms in a shared house)
5 nights hostels (4 of 5 private rooms due to bike security and shame about my snoring)