We all slept well last night and it didn’t rain!!!! Yippee!!!!

. . . Rod ended up swinging a different deal with the campground management so we ended up close to the bathrooms. Really works when he plays the ‘we are a bunch of old folks that need to go to the bathroom several times during the night’ story. Unfortunately, it is not a ruse but TRUE!!!!!

. . .  a few photos from our big dinner the night before. Mark and Jim were cooking. Mark first thought chicken pasta and in fact bought 4 pounds of frozen chicken. While it was thawing, our head carnivore Allen, who is from Fort Worth TX and knows his steak, found a full loin of rib eyes at the local meat market. Mark went shopping again, bought the whole loin and return to camp with 16 pounds of rib eye  . . .

. . . Jim served as grill meister while Allen supervised the operation!!!!

. . . medium rare, PLEASE!!!

. . . the steaks were ‘held at temp’ while the parmesan zucchini and mushrooms were grilled along with the cauliflower, broccoli, tomato veggie packets!!!!

Unbeknownst to me, back in MSN, neighbor JohnnyG was going to the market, bumped into emJay and asked her is she needed anything. ‘How about a nice steak’ she said . . .

. . . before prep

. . . after prep. Nice!!! We both had steak but 1,300 miles apart!!!!

. . . we advised Ally Gator that if she wanted to come back to the ‘dark side’, and start eating meat again, tonight was the night!!!! She settle for beans and the veggies. Strong willed woman!!!!

. . . considering Wade, Doc Mike, Bernie and David missed dinner there were only 1 1/2 steaks left . . . so obviously there was still time, and room, to make a visit to the Kit Kat Ice Cream Corner parlor in town . . .

. . . I had the double scoop chocolate fudge sundae, WITH a cherry of course!!!  Soon it was  . . . zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!

We woke to the threat of rain starting after 10:00am but it never materialized AND we had a great tailwind!!! Things went well early on with just enough shoulder and low traffic for our 65 mile ride to Port Huron, our home for the night . . .

I stopped at the half way point of Brown City. Supposedly the home of the motor home, I found no historical marker of display!!!

. . . I don’t think with was it!!!!!

. . . as I had a little ‘pick me up’, Shawna rolled in with her 11 axle milk truck. She rides her route daily.

The maximum allowable gross vehicle weight on the heaviest “Michigan-weight-law MDOT Intermodal Policy Division Policy/trucking/Truck Weights Michigan_1_6_17.doc Page 2 truck” is 164,000 pounds, which can only be achieved by use of eleven properly-spaced axles.  At 8.6 pounds a gallon, if I did my math right, their are over 4,700 quarts of potential chocolate milk in there!!!!

Like most diesel tractor drivers they do not turn off the engine when they so and my moment of piece while enjoying my ‘pick me up’ was disturbed for about 15 minutes. I went around the corner to the other side of the store.  After she left the noticed the town was crawling with motorcycles. They looked like ants crawling all over town. Ends up there is a ‘charity ride for hospice’ starting at noon and over 500 riders are expected. About 50 of them were already in town running up and down main street each trying to be louder than the last . . . I got out of town!!!

. . back out in the country it was peaceful. One thing I have notice in MI is you would not want to veer too far off the ACA prescribed route unless you REALLY knew where you were going. A LOT of unpaved, sand/gravel roads!!!!!

. . .  soon the village of Yale appeared on the horizon. Sorry we missed their special festival . . . sounds like fun !

. . . but it was easy to review, in these murals, EVERYTHING of any importance that has happened in Yale since 1850!!!!

A turn onto Hwy 19 brought an end to the great ride . . . two lanes, high traffic volume, very narrow shoulder and hundreds of motorcycles. They were all heading north to Brown City for the charity ride. Riding north in groups of 15-20, two abreast, they took up the hole lane, not allowing anyone to pass. The bad thing for a south bound cyclist was the noise and the fact they were blocking any south bound cars from pulling into the other lane to give a bicyclist a wide berth. VERY LOUD and SCARY ride for 20 miles . . . at Brockway I turned of the highway to take a trail the last 12 miles to Port Huron.

In Brockway was the ‘Eddie Munster’ House!!! Looked for the ‘Thing’,  but it was nowhere to be found!!!

. . . hey is it Leine time yet????  . . .Connies is thirsty!!!!

. . . on the 6 mile ride on Hwy 139, to the start of the trail, is where I almost met my maker. Near Brown Road, I could see a large tractor ahead coming out of a corn field, that would cross in front of me. I thought the woman driving saw me, but no.  Sitting high up in the enclosed cab, she had on earmuffs, like the kind you can buy at Farm & Fleet, with the little antenna sticking out the side meaning she was listening to the radio. At her height I ‘m sure she had scanned the road both ways looking for approaching cars, but never saw me. I skidded to a stop as she passed right in front of me. If I had not stopped it would have been the ‘Perfect Storm for me, as I probably would have been skewered by the hay bale forks she had on the front of the tractor.  As she vanished into the adjacent corn field, I let a few ‘suggestions’ fly. But she never heard them . . . and she never saw me . . .

. . . so it was with GREAT, GREAT pleasure when I got on the Wadhams to Avoca Trail. Not a great admirer of trail riding. the peace, quiet and lack of other riders . . .

. . .. made for a nice approach into the greater Port Huron area. One of my worst bicycling days  . . . ever!!!!!