Just as we did in April of 2018 Rick and I met up at a small town library so he could escort me the final twenty-five miles to his home on some of his favorite, lightly-traveled roads. The last time he led me into Lansing, back when it wasn’t under threat from white supremacists.
This time our destination was his girlfriend’s cottage on the shore of Lake Otsego, outside of Gaylord, 190 miles north of Lansing and 60 miles south of the Mackinac Bridge way north in the state. The library in Lowells wasn’t our designated meeting point, rather it was wherever we happened to meet up as Rick cycled towards me knowing the route I was coming in on. I stopped at the dinky library in Lowells, a room in this small town’s offices, to email Rick my location. Not ten minutes later Rick walked into the library, having spotted my bike out front, not having received my message.
I’d had a wonderful morning ride of twenty-five miles on F97 with hardly a vehicle passing. I could well understand why Rick was so enamored with this road, enough so that he had biked the 190 miles up to Gaylord from Lansing three times this summer, then driving back to Lansing with Jeanie, his girlfriend of twenty-five years. He used to make the ride in one day, taking no more than twelve hours, thanks to a lifetime of conditioning that at one time back in the ‘70s had him strong enough to qualify for the national championships on the road and on the track and have Olympic and even Tour de France aspirations.
He can still ride with the Big Dogs, but rather than making a day of the nearly two hundred mile ride between his residences, he divides it into two, carrying a tent and sleeping bag so he can camp halfway. His three rides this summer are his most in one summer. Thanks to Covid allowing him to conduct his business on Zoom and on-line, he had spent more time in Gaylord this summer than he had the previous ten summers combined.
It wasn’t that the biking was so much better up there than in Lansing, as in the summer months the roads are clogged with vacationers, many in grotesquely large “McMansion” RVs. Even worse are the reckless locals in their black pickup trucks, who he fears all want to run him off the road. He’d love to carry a baseball bat so he could swing it at their heads, just barely missing, so they’d know how he felt when they pass him so closely. The perils of the road are outweighed by the cozy comfort of Jeanie’s long-time family cottage and its million-dollar view out over the six-mile by one-mile lake. It is nestled right up to the lake and has one of its few beaches a few steps from it’s porch.
The view to the left isn’t so fabulous, as it is of a recently built, inordinately large house on two lots with a sprawling driveway that takes up a good part of the property to accommodate a three-car garage. It was made an even worse eyesore with most of the trees on the property having been cut down, in contrast to just about every other residence on the lake clustered with trees. “A Detroiter,” Rick said, just like the neighbor to the right, though that one had a much more civil mindset, kind enough to let them use their WiFi before Rick and Jeanie installed their own.
Like all the cottages ringing the lake these were close enough that when Rick and Jeanie were on their porch, they could engage in conversation with their neighbors without having to raise their voices. In the summer months when the lake was crowded Rick had to try to block out all the noise from the neighbor’s socializing along with the near non-stop jet skiers on the lake and leaf-blowers and lawn-mowers.
Summer was actually his least favorite time to be at their retreat. He was particularly aggravated by all the “nature-fakers” holidaying there who were always in a hurry to get somewhere or do something and were afflicted by that disease of the “me” in America. They had come to be in nature, but didn’t know how to do it.
Our first ten miles of cycling together on F97 couldn’t have been finer, other than a three-mile stretch of badly pocked road, as we were able to ride side-by-side chatting away with only two non-aggressive vehicles intruding upon us. It is hard to find such a road anywhere, at least in the paved universe. I was in a good mood as I had finally found a Michigan license plate earlier in the day to add to my collection. It wasn’t the version with the “Pure Michigan” slogan, but it would do. Rick said he couldn’t recall ever seeing a license plate along the road in his thousands of miles of biking all over the state. I was delighted to hear him say that, as it was a good omen that I’d find another while riding with him.
And indeed I did the next day, and it was a “Pure” one, when we took a ride to a nearby ski resort on the fringe of what Rick calls the “Otsego Alps.” Rick rode right past it, not attuned to the offerings of the road. He was similar to Chris, who I rode with in June. He hadn’t spotted a single neckerchief in the 9,000 miles he had ridden up to that point on his trip. But after I gathered a couple in our time together, his eyes were opened and now I hear from him regularly about his latest find as he nears the completion of his ride on the Oregon coast, about to finish up his nine-month circuit of the States at his starting point south of San Francisco. I’ve gathered three neckerchiefs so far on this trip, including a take on the flag with rows of white stars on three diagonal strips of red and blue.
The road does provide. I mentioned earlier how I wished I’d brought along heavier gloves with the temperature in just the thirties some mornings. Since then I have found two strays that will do. They are both left-handed, but one is large enough that I can flip it over and fit my thumb in the thumb slot and little finger in the far right slot.
There is a minimum of aluminum cans along the road, as Michigan has a ten-cent bounty on them. I didn’t realize that until I noticed a cluster of disheveled folk with shopping carts full of cans gathered in a corner outside a Walmart. I thought they were an enclave of homeless sheltering themselves from the cold wind. But then I noticed one gain entry, taking his cart in to feed his cans into a machine. Since then I’ve spotted lines of people returning cans and bottles outside of grocery stores.
A golf course adjoined the ski resort. It was hard for us to fathom why so many guys would want to be hitting golf balls on a driving range when they could be riding bikes, getting their blood flowing, feeling alert and alive and taking in an ever unfolding panorama of fabulous scenery on this gorgeous fall day. Standing around whacking at balls seemed like a silly endeavor, as they no doubt regarded us riding bikes. Hadn’t we heard of the automobile?
Rick had been on its board of directors and caused a ruckus one year when he refused to ride with the mandatory safety flag on it stick, electing to just have it dangle out of his rear jersey pocket. A rules-stickler wanted to ban him from the ride. That led to a “Let Rick Ride” campaign that caused such a stir that one need only type those three words into google search to find out all about it.
As always, it was an enlightening and entertaining time spent with Rick and well worth the swing up to Gaylord into the cold north wind.
No comments:
Post a Comment