I’m settling in for the night. A few comments.

The neighbors are quiet. Aside from the air conditioner on the RV next door. The screaming kids are all snug in their campers.

The wind is picking up. Enough that I had to get out of the tent and tighten the rain fly to stop it flapping. And it’s coming from the east, which is odd because the rain is still coming from the west.

The air mattress is going to take getting used to. It’s a bit like sleeping on waterbed, and that’s not a good thing in my book. One key is not to fill it all the way; it needs room to sag where needed. But I still think it’ll be worth it.

I had a pleasantly uneventful late-afternoon ride from Idlewild to Cadillac. I found some easy-to-follow backroads north. What made them easy to follow is that the route I was taking was the only paved road. From time there’d be an intersection where the road I was on turned to dirt, but the pavement would continue around the corner. That was where I was supposed to turn.

Since I was basically riding a few miles east of M37 much of the way, I saw little traffic, mostly just locals. I passed a couple trailheads for motorbike trails, but didn’t try them out. I don’t think my suspension and tires are really cut out for off-road biking. 🙂 The terrain is getting a little hilly, but not too bad. At times the scooter can only get up to 35mph going up hills. Its performing quite well overall.

I arrived in Cadillac a little after 7pm. That’s later than I had planned, but considering that I was 2 hours late getting underway this morning, I consider that doing pretty well.

And to be honest, I don’t think I missed a whole lot by getting here late. Mitchell State Park… is… what it is. It’s… an RV lot. I think it may even be within the Cadillac city limits. Next door to a Burger King.

To be fair, it’s actually in a pretty nice location, on the small strip of land between Cadillac and Mitchell Lakes, with easy access to both of them. It’s a nice spot for people from the area to take their families for an outdoor vacation. And it beats the Motel 6 I was stuck at a year ago when my tent went missing. It has no waterfalls, no hiking trails, and only Mitchell Lake for sunsets. But it has two little lakeshores and a channel between them.

After taking that in, I drew upon the wisdom of the Internet and ended up at Maggie’s Tavern in downtown Cadillac for a late dinner and a couple beers. Good food. Good drink.

Radar shows some slow moving rain over Wisconsin, which will probably arrive overnight. So full rain protocols will be in effect at the campsite tonight.

I’m at the premiere Negro resort of the Midwest. At least it was.

Idlewild is a small community just east of Baldwin. In the days of Jim Crow, this was one of the few places in the country where middle-class African-Americans could come without facing discrimination, and even own property. Not coincidentally, it became a Mecca for jazz and blues musicians. Louis Armstrong and W.E.B. DuBois owned property here. The name itself is so evocative, it sounds like something out of fiction. It was known as “Black Eden”.

But the silver cloud of desegregation had a grey lining: now that they could go (generally) anywhere, African-Americans no longer needed places like Idlewild, and it has become just another rural village in northern Michigan. Most of the roads were never paved, and the houses were generally small and cheaply made. There’s new construction here too, and a nice little park for public access to crystal-clear Idlewild Lake (where I’m sitting now). There are signs up celebrating the community’s centennial this year.

A little like the dams, I wouldn’t have made this trip just to come here. By coincidence I learned of Idlewild about a month ago, then noticed that it was along the route of this ride. Like the Womyn’s Music Festival or the gay resorts in Saugatuck, it’s not the sort of thing one expects to find around here. But here it is.

I got on the road a little after 11, taking advantage of a narrow corridor between rain clouds to get out of town. The roads were wet, which I especially hazardous after the first rain in a long time because it dislodges all the oil and whatnot that’s been accumulating on the road. So I was careful.

I headed pretty much due north on Jupiter Ave and Pine Island Dr, both of which had little traffic. The clouds broke up a but and it’s been partly cloudy so far. I stopped for gas at the freeway exit for Cedar Springs; I really should have filled up before leaving the GR metro area, but I figured (correctly) that fuel would be easyish to find while still in Kent County.

I’ve stopped at Croton Hardy Dam, half because it’s on the way, and Hal because I’ve heard of it repeatedly my whole life and figured I should see it. It’s actually two dams, one after the other, each with its own pond begin it and a hydroelectric plant.

I had a lateish lunch at the Driftwood Inn in Croton, nothing fancy, just a quick chicken wrap.

It’s not raining, and it looks like it won’t rain here today. It’s not raining in Cadillac, and judging from radar it looks like the rain might miss Cadillac too. But it’s raining in between. In fact, there’s a line of heavy rain storms marching in a line between here and there.

At the speed they’re going, it’ll be several hours before they pass, so I don’t think I can just wait them out, not if I want to get there at a reasonable hour. I have still have some preparation to do (such as packing the scooter), so I’ll keep an eye on it and see if I can time my departure to minimize the rain time. Or just gear up and ride through it.

Since I had someone ask about it today (hi, Mom!), here’s the capsule nearest-city version of my itinerary for this year’s Big Ride:

• Wed, 18th – to Cadillac
• Thur, 19th – to Petoskey
• Fri, 20th – to DeTour, UP
• Sat, 21st – to Tahquamenon Falls, UP
• Sun, 22nd – to St. Ignace, UP
• Mon, 23rd – to Atlanta, MI
• Tues, 24th – to Midland
• Wed, 25th – to Grand Rapids

And here’s a rough map of the route. Google Maps won’t let me put in all of the detours I plan to make, to stay off major roads, but it should give you a good idea of where I’ll be. The green letters are the places I’ll be camping each night.