My route today was a combination of what I did not do yesterday and what I should be doing today.
The sun does not make its appearance until a little after 6 a.m. in Escanaba in the Eastern time zone. Combine that with the overcast and low Cloud deck and a mild wind made for a cold feeling ride. Traffic was light at that time in the morning on busy US 2. That was good for me as I didn’t obstruct any traffic until the Escanaba River Bridge. That bridge is not a good path for bicyclist on a normal day according to the adventure cycling association. Road construction closed down two of the bridge lanes so each direction had 1 lane and there was no shoulder at all. I waited for a gap in the morning traffic and hurried across the lane going over the river and only delayed one person. The rest of the road conditions were good with a wide shoulder and a rumble strip to separate traffic. There was road construction for five miles where they had prepped the surface for paving. That makes for slow cycling. Or it could be just me that’s slow.
Not much to see other than trees today. I did stop at a Wayside on Lake Michigan and had a conversation with a Wisconsin couple from Rhinelander. They had seen me on the road and the man said it had a motor and the lady said it was some sort of weird bicycle. The lady was very happy to tell her husband that she was right. They came close to look at the velomobile and had to hurry back as a flock of gulls were getting very close to their picnic lunch.
The good news today is that my hips seem to be working fine. Even after today’s 87 miles I do not have any problems. Which is good because the bathtub at this motel (mentioned in the adventure cycling guide) is not something I really want to sit in.
This hotel is included in the adventure cycling description as a place to stay. The man at the desk was surprised to hear that this Motel was on a bicycle route. He had wondered why he had seen so many bicycles on US 2. The Motel must have changed names recently since it does not match the one in the guide. Apparently two years ago this Motel had an issue with prostitution as I looked up the motel to find out if I was actually staying in the right place. Now there’s a retired 71 year old engineer that lives here full time. So the sleeping bag comes into use again as I think this counts as camping.
Back to civilization tomorrow as I hope that Sprint coverage once again resumes. Actually looking forward to a more populated area. Local news seems to give the impression that the UP has unique issues with getting food and needs to encourage local fresh produce production. Interesting factoid – only the 4 western most counties in the UP are in the Central time zone.