Notes
Started the ride in Muskegon on a beautiful, windless sunny day. We left around 7:30 AM which was good timing overall. The ride started easy enough on a flat, smooth bike trail through a wooded corridor. The trail took us up through a bunch of towns spread out across about 40miles or so. As the trail wove its way northward, it started punishing us more and more. first the trail became rough asphalt which was energy sapping to ride across. then there appeared 2" wide cracks every 15 feet or so, these provided a constant painful bump to the rear for many miles. We ended our bike trail stint in Hart, MI at a local bakery. There we had some nice refreshments (biscuits and gravy, donuts, Sprecher root beer!) and talked to the 70y/o owners about the best way to get to Traverse city. They recommended going by the lake which turned out to be a really good idea.
From Hart we went up on some deserted country highways for awhile and had some really fast riding, the wind was at our backs which helped a lot too! Soon the highway gave way to some country roads. Soon the paved country roads gave way to some dusty ones. This being the last day and the roads being less frequent, we took these in stride. They provided some challenge to staying up on the bike but we were able to do it for sure.
Later on in the ride I started feeling nauseous and headachey and bloated, a sign that I was either dehydrated or overheating, likely the latter. We stopped in Manistee at a lovely sandwich shop and took or time there. I felt a lot better after a grilled pb&J and a mango smoothie! Next we biked on near the coast up through a few other towns - these were all gorgeous in their own right and the roads were a lot of run to bike on, winding, wooded ups and downs.
After passing through Onekama we really found ourselves out in the middle of the country. We slowed up a bit and enjoyed a nice 45 min stretch or so where we were on flat country roads going through the Manistee national forest. During this time no cars passed us at all! It was really nice a peaceful and it was my second favorite part of the ride.
After some while going on the empty road, we came to another dirt road which google recommended. We took this one too and found it to be a little better under-tire than the first road. This was good because the road ended up being dirt for roughly 4 miles. It was a sandy/rocky dirt as well, not a muddy dirt. One funny part came when we saw a bunch of kids and dogs on mountain bikes coming up the road in the opposite direction, I asked them if/when the road became paved again and they informed me that it would become paved in only about 200ft or so. I breathed a sigh of relief and said "great!" Then they said that about 1/4mile past where the road becomes paved it goes back to dirt haha! The road was only paved to facilitate going down into a gorge and crossing over a river.
Biking on we eventually hit some more really loose dirt (which by now we just laughed off) and came to a large gas station. We filled up on more fuel and pushed off. In about 2 miles we came to a point where there the road we were on turned West and there should have been a turn off for North. Turns out there was a turn off - onto a muddy, doubletrack snowmobile path. It seems google has marked these as good bike routes! We ended up taking the snowmobile path for about 3 miles or so, then it put us out onto a little bit too rough "Cinder road"
We followed cinder road for a long time which sucked because it was rough enough to hurt mildly as well as sap your speed away. Once off cinder, it was a hop, skip, and a 20 mile jump through interlochen to Traverse city airport! The two highlights of this path were: a huge, empty and perfectly smooth downhill which I am sure I surpassed 50mph on without fear. The second highlight was gettnig to the traverse city airport and riding right through the rental car lot, into the airport, and down the hallway to the rental car area without getting off!
I finished the ride extremely dehydrated and as close to passing out as I ever have. my legs were twiching and I was impatient/grumpy which for me indicates a bad health state. Either way, we packed up the car, went to the traverse city travelodge (where roving bands of children ruled the parking lot and underwear clad drunk 20somethings ruled the jacuzzi), grabbed a half asleep meal of mexican food and watered down margharitas, and went to bed for some much needed sleep.
to give you an idea of how tired I was, I woke up the next morning to wobbly legs, a dry throat and poor balance. It took me two full days to not feel hungover and to be able to walk properly!
A great trip overall!