Day 9. Extra Miles

9/2/2025 Tuesday

Petoskey MI to Kewadin MI

Stats: Miles: 55 AIS: 5:03. Speed: 10.9mph Elev . 1115 ft

Let’s start with yesterdays videos

We all slept well last night, up as usual for today’s long ride to Kewadin where we will stay with our WarmShower hosts Ann and Gary. We decided to push some extra miles today so we have a short day Wednesday. The weather forecast Wednesday is rainy, rainy, rainy. We’d like to make it to Traverse City before it starts to rain hard! They’re expecting .75” of rain and 15mph headwind. It’s going to be a nasty 25 miles!

We started on a wonderful paved bicycle trail from our campground all the way to Charlevoix… about 25 miles. Traveling these wonderful paths is great but it is quite a bit slower because they meander and have so many entrances to homes and businesses that slow you down.

Petoskey town had the most beautiful parade of large Victorian homes along the lakeshore. That was quite a treat seeing so many beautiful old homes! I didn’t stop for any pictures… too busy riding to stop. Didn’t stop for very many pictures today because we had to get 55 miles in today! That’s above my favorite 40-ish… meaning AIS (ass in saddle of 5+ hours!)

The trail was often along the lakeshore so the scenery was beautiful. We were in the Little Traverse Bay all the way to Charlevoix. Charlevoix had a lake that had a drawbridge with a channel for boats to access Lake Michigan. We did have to wait for sailboat and a few other boats to go through. Then we took a street to a road along the lakeshore that had a park to stop for lunch. Along this road were some more amazing special homes… and the mushroom house! The architect designed 26 homes in this town… all with very unique roofs. You can google Mushroom house in Charlevoix to read more about this designer. I’ve seen similar “hobbit homes” in Carmel CA

This area of northern Michigan is famous for fruit trees. Cherry, apple, peaches. There are big orchard farm stores along the highway. Some farms are converting to vineyards, so wineries are popping up along the highway.

We had a long ride today…the first 40 miles were great and the highway had a great shoulder. Then suddenly the shoulder narrowed considerably with a narrow paved section and a big gravel section. Not so good! Traffic was busy. We did find a side road to Ann and Gary’s lovely country home at the end of a gravel road.

Ann and Gary offered us a large room upstairs with lots of beds and a bathroom adjacent. Perfect! Ann made a nice dinner to share with us. Lovely quinoa salad and the best sweet corn I’ve tasted this season! Afterwards we sat around the campfire and visited for about an hour. So generous and kind. They’ve done a lot of cycling themselves over the years. I think there were 4 bikes in the garage. Gary gave us directions for a good route out of town for tomorrow heading to Traverse City.

I tried to find a WarmShowers host in Traverse City for tomorrow but either got no reply or they weren’t available. We’re going to find ourselves a hotel to spend a dry night.