Thursday, August 29, 2013

Day 2 Summer Trip Lake Michigan

Friday August 16.  Couderay Wisc to Gould City, Michigan (U.P.).

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood.  Breakfast was sausage and french toast.  Dishes washed, bags packed and we were ready to go @ 8:00 AM.  Plan is to take twisty county roads in northern Wisc and end up at Eagle River at the east end of the state for lunch.  My favorite brother-in-law, Charlie, will be our tour guide this morning.  He has a guitar pickin' gig this evening and will need to get back home for that.   A scripture reading then a prayer and we were on our way.

County  C, CC, B, S, FF, K were some of the "alphabet roads" we hit this morning.  All were nice and twisty.  S was very twisty but turned bumpy after awhile, it also is designated a "Rustic Road" by Wisconsin. I stopped for a picture, the state will send me a certificate once I have ten pictures of myself on Rustic Roads:



 Weather was ideal, scenery was great and traffic was light.  Perfect in every way.

We made it to Eagle River, WI for lunch as planned.  Found a family restaurant, rested and ate a pretty good meal.  I warned everyone that our best riding of the day was behind us in that we now had to make some headway on heavy traveled roads to get to our destination in the Upper Peninsula.  This meant state hwy 70 then U.S. 2 east.  70 actually wasn't too bad but US 2 was kind of miserable.  Heavy traffic, some construction, slow down for towns and heat.  We also bid adieu to Uncle Charlie.  He would be taking Hwy 70 straight west to home.


We made a quick stop to pick up some meds for Lloyd at a neat town called Manistique.  It's a tourist town on the north shore of Lake Michigan with many beaches.  Unfortunately we had no time for beaches today.  The shadows were getting long and we still needed to find our resort/campground.  Just another 30 miles or so to the Michihistrigan.

The Michistrigan was chosen because it was the only place I could find that had both beds and campsites for the two odd ducks who wanted to pitch a tent (Steve and me).  We had the largest cabin reserved for the other six guys which had three bedrooms with double bunk beds and a living room and bath.  Pretty nice accommodations for around $13 a head.  There also was a newly remodeled family restaurant offering all you can eat fish.  Cod, haddock or whitefish.  Our waitress, Jen, thought it was strange that we had all ordered cod or haddock until she explained that the whitefish is local and fresh.  It was then whitefish all around and it was delicious!  I will insert a picture of us at the restaurant if/when those other Fossils share them with me.  In the mean time here we are in front of the cabin:

After our fish dinner we had a bible study.  Back into the qualifications of a "Good Servant of Jesus"  Point two: Be nourished on the words of faith and sound doctrine (I Tim 4:6b).

Lights out and to bed (or sleeping pad) we went...

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Summer Trip, Lake Michigan, Day 1

Thursday, August 15, 2013.  MSP to Couderay, WI


Our meeting place was the Fleet Farm Parking lot off of I35W in Blaine.  Meeting time was 3:30.  We are eight Fossils strong:  Steve, Rick, Lloyd, Wayne, Jim, Bill, Keith and Greg.  Weather was sunny, in the mid 80's.  This weather would remain the same all weekend.... Can't beat that!

We already were meeting other bikers and sharing our business cards.  Steve really got excited about a guy on another Honda Magna, unfortunately he wasn't a member of our group (yet).  Keith read a scripture from Isaiah: "The LORD is watching out for us".  Then a prayer and we were on our way.  Our goal today is supper at the DQ, in Turtle Lake Wisc then Wayne's huntin' shack near Couderay before dark.  In MN we were on I35, MN97 & 95.  In Wisc, US8, then WI48.  Too much of a hurry to spend much time on twisty side roads today.



Everything went according to plan we made it to the county road near my (Wayne) cabin and the shadows were getting long but still well into daylight.  We were seeing deer around the edges of the woods but they stayed off the road.

At the shack everyone unloaded and found a bed.  Then the bible study.  I Tim chapter 4 is our study this year.  The description of a "Good Servant of Jesus Christ".  Twelve points are in the chapter, chances of getting through all of them in four days are slim.  We made it through the overview and the first point:  "A good servant of  Jesus points out error" (vs6a).

The rest of the night was snacking and talking.  It is good to be a gang again.