Day 12 - Back to Duluth!

After 11 days of travel I finally made it back to Duluth. The day started off great. The breakfast that was prepared for us at the Garden House B&B was fantastic. We started off with freshly sliced fruit and a fruit smoothie and then had baked oatmeal topped with yogurt and homemade fruit preserves. That also came with homemade scones and banana bread. And if that wasn't enough, we had a very small dish of homemade ice cream for dessert.

Maybe because of the energy I had from a great breakfast, adrenaline from it being the last day or knowing I didn't have to save energy for the next day but I had the quickest start to my ride of the entire trip. Rolling terrain but I rode the first 40 miles without taking a break (except to stop and take a quick picture) in just over three hours time. The next sixteen miles however were not that fun and took over two hours. Getting back to my car through the streets of Superior and Duluth was awful. Had to ride through a few sketchy neighborhoods and some busy streets but in the end I got back! Hard to believe it is over. It went unbelievably quick.

So, eleven days if travel to make it around the lake (nine riding and two on the ferry) with 483 miles on the bike. I drove to Mason City, IA and stayed in a hotel to break up the long drive back. I am riding Thursday night with friends back home and I will put up photos if I take a few. Really happy everything went so smoothly on the trip and the bike held up great. Didn't even have to put air in the tires along the way. Here are pictures from the last day of riding.

 

 

 

 

 

I found the "welcome Canadians" line was pretty funny.

 

 

Back to Duluth....

 

 

Heading back to Omaha!

 

Day 11 - Port Wing, WI

This edition of "One mile at a time" is coming to you from the back deck of the Garden House Bed & Breakfast in Port Wing. This is the first time I have stayed at a B&B and it is obviously quite different than the normal hotel experience. As I rode up to the place it looks like I am staying at someone's house and that's what is. The house doesn't look any different than the other ones around here except there's a small add-on to it. An older couple named Tom and Karleen own and run the place. From talking with Tom when I arrived they have owned the place for the last fifteen years. The back deck is great. Shaded and really nice. They have five acres behind here with a fish pond and a few small trails. It is also completely surrounded by trees. I also found out that Tom and Karleen love to ride bikes as well and have done some tours down in Georgia over the years. Naturally, he was interested in my trip and bike as well. I put my bike in their garage and he showed me the bikes he and his wife had. I counted six of them! Breakfast is at 7:30 am tomorrow and I imagine I will eat better for breakfast tomorrow than any other day on this trip.

Great ride today. Heading up to Washburn rather than staying in Ashland was a blessing in disguise. I may not have found out the extent of the construction on Hwy 2 and would have had a miserable day. Going to Washburn was on the way to here so it was almost as if I planned this all along. Washburn to Cornucopia was a 20 mile stretch with a gradual climb for the first several miles and then the biggest, longest hill I have come across to approach Mt. Valhalla. Not long after that I ran into six guys out on a ride (they were stopped at the time) and they flagged me over and talked for a bit. After riding my tank for a week and a half I envied their lightweight carbon fiber bikes! We talked for a bit and they mentioned they were stopping at the coffee shop in Cornucopia (12 miles up) and invited me to join. It was a quick ride there since it was downhill on all new pavement. Ended up sitting there chatting with them for about 45 minutes and then had a good ride into Port Wing. Only 38 miles on the odometer today.

Last day tomorrow. It has been a great trip but I am looking forward to getting home. Should be an easy 50 or so tomorrow but the last 20 I have to go on county roads, city streets and bike paths to get back to my car because the main road into Duluth from Superior (you have to cross over Lake Superior to get there) doesn't allow bike traffic. Not a big deal as there are other ways in. Today's pictures:

 

I took a county road to get to Cornucopia from Washburn. Their county roads are basically highways though. All paved with shoulders and striping.

 

Always nice to see. Means there are a lot of bikes in the area. I found out that 20 mile stretch is used a lot by competitive cyclists in the area due to the hills and light traffic. Looks like a Surly Steamroller, Preuss!

 

Golf course outside of Washburn with Lake Superior as the backdrop.

 

 

Good stretch of road all day. Below is the coffee shop I stopped at in Cornucopia. The town can't have more than 150 people that live there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The last three are from the B&B here.

Well, that's it for today. Hopefully tomorrow goes well and my car is waiting for me back in Duluth. I am staying in Mason City, IA tomorrow night to break up the trip (nine hour drive after riding the last week and a half would not be good for the legs!) and looking forward to driving again!

 

Update on tomorrow

So, I am not going to Iron River after all. After some heavy traffic today and talking to some people around here about the road construction I am heading northwest to Cornucopia and on to Port Wing where I am staying the night at a bed & breakfast. Should be interesting.

The road construction they are doing is re-paving and there are no shoulders and narrow two lane traffic. Plus I was also told the traffic gets much heavier the farther west I go on here and someone here joked they don't even like to drive on Hwy 2.

The nice thing is it doesn't add any extra mileage to my day tomorrow but does add a few hills which isn't a big deal. It should be better scenery to ride as well. It should only add a few miles to Wednesday so all in all it will be a better way to go. Much less traffic and better riding conditions.

Probably won't be any more updates on here until Wednesday night since I now won't have wifi tomorrow. Until then...

Day 10 - Washburn, WI

Greetings from the hometown of 2004 Olympic gold medalist Paul Hamm. According to the sign at the town entrance he won gold in the all-around competition in men's gymnastics. I also seem to remember him getting arrested not that long ago for assaulting a cab driver but they left that off the sign for some reason. Anyway, I am in Washburn today. Overall it was a pretty easy day of riding with mostly downhills and a few uphills thrown in for old times sake. Knocked out 52 miles and was done around 1:00. Not a bad day. A few hiccups though. I got into Ashland (about 11 miles from here) and the highway through town was under construction and lanes were restricted so that made for an interesting ride through town. As I got out of that town to head up here there was also a sign saying there would be road construction for the next 20 miles. Now, that sometimes isn't bad because it might just be coned off and I can still ride in the lane. Just have to wait and see until tomorrow.

I only have about 33 miles tomorrow so it will be another early day finished. I am about 80 miles out of Duluth right now. I could probably knock it out in a day but that wouldn't be the point of this trip. Crazy to think that what takes me an hour and fifteen minutes in the car would take 8-9 hours of pedaling.

Today and the first few miles of tomorrow will be the last I see of the lake until I get into Duluth. Will probably get up and going early again tomorrow. Beats some of the traffic. Plus I might the youngest person by 35 years in this campground. It is a recurring theme.

Pictures from today...

 

I think the "open for business" part is a bit much.

 

 

 

 

Not sure what this was but they were having a good time destroying it.

 

 

 

 

 

This is the "beach" right at the bottom of my campground. There were some stairs that let down to here.

 

 

Confirmed: The water is cold.

Off to Iron River tomorrow!

 

Day 9 - Ironwood, MI

I am sitting in a McDonald's in Ironwood after another day of 62 miles. Why McDonald's? Free wifi! My campground tonight doesn't have wifi so this seemed like a good option. Today wasn't as hard as yesterday but definitely tested my legs again. The first ten miles of the ride were table-top flat and I had to remind myself what it was like to ride on flat terrain. It has honestly been since my third day of riding from Grand Marais out about 15 miles since I rode more than a few miles of flat terrain. Once those ten glorious miles were up I had about 18 miles of gradual uphill. Flat to rolling the rest of the way except for the last ten miles which had some big uphills. There was really no downhills today compared to the first two. Yesterday and Friday I ended up around the same elevation as my start. Today I am about 900 feet up. I think I am mostly done with major hills but I have been wrong before!

Six days of riding done and three more to go. However, the big days are done. I have 48, 33 and 45 miles left. Not bad compared to the average of 60 the last three. I also bid farewell to the state of Michigan tomorrow and cross over into Wisconsin pretty much as soon as I get out of town tomorrow morning. I am looking forward to finding some Spotted Cow beer once I get into Wisconsin (only sold there...Bryan and Angie brought some back last year from the Wisconsin game and it was excellent) and getting closer to my final destination. Pretty good feeling to have a lot of the miles behind me.

Pictures from the day:

 

 

This skunk and I had a 30 second standoff. He wouldn't get out of the road and just stood there looking at me with his tail up. I gave him about 20 yards of space and he finally left. I guess if he had sprayed me I wouldn't have had to worry about people near my campsite tonight.

 

 

 

I was riding though the Ottawa National Forest for a big chunk of the day. Lot of nature there.

 

 

 

That's it for today! Tomorrow I am off to Washburn, WI. Should be a good ride tomorrow!

 

Day 8 - Ontonagon, MI

Today's ride was brought to you by the number 62 and the letter H. 62 miles of hills, heat and headwinds made for a long day. As I left Hancock this morning I was treated to five miles of a serious climb. Before I got to the top of that hill there was a grocery store I stopped at and I got some food and snacks to get me through the day since I was going to be on a pretty desolate stretch of road. I had already drained one bottle of water in that five miles so I bought a couple extra bottles of water in case I wasn't able to find somewhere to refill. Glad I did because I went through a lot of water today even though I found a place to refill. It got up to about 90 degrees again here today which is unusually hot. Supposed to cool back down tomorrow thankfully. The hills were brutal today. The first ten miles tested me and just made the next several miles really tough. Wasn't until about 25 miles in I got my legs underneath me. A couple of the mile or two stretches had 3.5-4% grades. Pretty tough. Might look at the route tomorrow to see how hilly it is and if I can minimize some of it. Tomorrow is my last day over 50 miles so after tomorrow things should get easier!

Didn't see the lake at all today until I got to Ontonagon. Went through forest today so the pictures won't be overly exciting. Something about the lake doesn't get old as far as scenery goes but the forest can get monotonous. I am probably getting a little spoiled at this point! Ended up getting a pizza for dinner tonight and put it on the front rack of my bike since the motel is four miles out of town. The Porcupine Mountain Music Festival is going on nearby and everything else is booked including all the campsites at this place. Kind of nice to have a room after a day like today though! Have a fridge and a microwave too so I got a couple beverages as well to enjoy the day!

Back in central time tomorrow so I gain a hour! That will be great. Here are pictures from today.

 

 

Some of the trees are already changing color around here.

 

 

That was by Twin River. There is a small lake by there. I also found out that a lot of the houses right on Lake Superior are vacation homes (not a huge surprise) but the state of Michigan gives permanent residents that live on the lake property tax breaks but the individuals that use them as vacation homes pay the full amount. My guess is if they have a vacation house there they can afford the property taxes.

 

Really need a sign for that, Michigan???

 

While that downhill was great, I had to climb back up to where those high trees were.

 

This is the Ontonagon River flowing into Lake Superior.

Well, on that note, I am going to enjoy relaxing tonight and watching some TV. Off to Ironwood, MI tomorrow. Not sure if it will have wifi unless I find a coffee shop in town or somewhere like that. Have a great weekend!