Let It Be Known That I Take Requests

June 19, 2024

Baraga State Park

Last night, the weather forecasters were proven right. A storm moved into Houghton at 11:30 p.m. and raged for about 3 hours. Lightning, thunder, heavy rain, flash flood warnings--all visible to me from behind the thick glass window in my 5th-floor room. There was no large hail though.

I hope the weather folks are as accurate in their prediction of cloudy skies but no rain for today. However, rain or no rain, it was time to move on from Houghton. (In case I get all wrapped up in writing today's post and forget to report the results, I'll do it now. Congratulations to the forecasters; they got it right again.)

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Before I could leave Houghton, I had a special task to carry out. Yesterday, I got a message from a Cycleblazer who actually read the picture I posted of a plaque on the side of Trinity Episcopalian Church. The plaque mentioned some wood carvings in the church that are the work of a dude named Aloycius Lang of Oberammergau, Germany. The Cycleblazer said something like, "I wish you had a picture of the wood carvings."

Her wish is my command. I snuck into the back door of the building, tip-toed up a flight of stairs, found my way to the main part of the church, and walked up to the altar. It was quite dark.

"May I help you," said a voice from behind. I went through the spiel I had prepared in case anybody caught me in the church--the stuff about seeing the plaque and posting it on-line and a woman from Germany wanted to see pictures of Lang's carvings and I was hoping to accommodate her request, etc.

"No problem," he said, "let me turn some lights on for you."

If he is typical of all Episcopalians, I'd have to say they're almost as friendly as Church of the Great Outdoorsians.

There you go, Suzanne. I'm glad I went back, because it really is quite beautiful.

Since I'm on a roll, I'll display a few more pictures of historic buildings and other random curiosities in the city of Houghton. Like the Houghton County Courthouse and the St. Ignatius Loyola Catholic Church.

Eventually, I got out of town. I had been cruising down the busy Highway 41 for a couple miles before I looked to my left and noticed some other cyclists on what looked like a bike trail. If it was a bike trail, they were riding closer to the lake than I was. I took the next left turn to investigate.

Sure enough, it WAS a bike trail. Wow, how could I not have known about that? After about a mile of the trail, I wished I still didn't know about it. I made one of my award-winning videos to show what I mean.

Rail trials can sometimes be nice alternatives to busy highways. Not this trail on this day. I'm glad it was easy to escape the trail and get back on the busy highway. It was definitely more scenic.

Here's a funny story regarding that video. When I recorded it, I did not know the name of the trail. Later, I Googled the following words: "What is the name of the rail trail that runs from Houghton to Chassel."

Google answered, "The Houghton to Chassel Rail Trail." I don't know, maybe that's funnier to me than it is to you.

In this case, Highway 41 was better than the Houghton to Chassel Rail Trail--especially with that wide shoulder.

I've been seeing those wild purple missile flowers all over the U.P., but this was one of the biggest gardens yet.

The paper map I'd been looking at all day shows Highway 41 right up next to Lake Superior's Keweenaw Bay shoreline. I was a little upset with my friends, Rand & McNally, for their deception. It wasn't fair that I had only seen a few sporadic glimpses of my favorite lake in the world.

In fairness to Rand-McNally, though, I think the view-blockers were a major factor too. Whatever, I enjoyed the ride.

What the . . .? I was taking a little break at a roadside rest area when I saw this thing drive through.

That rest area was about seven miles away from my destination for the night. Imagine my glee when the next seven miles had almost non-stop views of the Great Lake.

The name of this town also gave me glee. I've been told that I'm kind of assinins.

It was kind of a windy ride, but there were no difficult hills. Overall, it was fun. The camping was fun too--except for the fact that Baraga State Park is right next to the loud, busy highway. And I can't explain why I didn't take any more pictures after Assinine--no pictures of the Village of Baraga, and no pictures of the State Park.

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Today's ride: 30 miles (48 km)
Total: 258 miles (415 km)

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marilyn swettI was hoping you'd ride north to Copper Harbor. We did that several years ago. It was a beautiful ride. I kind of hoped we could catch a ferry to Isle Royal from there but they were all booked. But we did spend the night in a historic lighthouse on the west side of the peninsula. I wonder if it's still operating? It was a very cool B&B but the owner was a little weird.
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2 months ago

Bruce LellmanI just thought of this. I wonder if you can put a bike on the ferry in Copper Harbor to Isle Royale. They probably don't allow bikes on Isle Royale but I wonder if you could time it so that once you are there with your not allowed bike you could then catch the ferry to Grand Marais, thus making it possible to do a pretty cool circle tour around Lake Superior.
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2 months ago

Gregory GarceauTo marilyn swettI was planning to go to Copper Harbor, but with all the dilly dallying and rain delays, I decided to head south and east toward Marquette. Soon, I will look up your journal so I can read about the weird B&B host.
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2 months ago

Gregory GarceauTo Bruce LellmanI don't think the ferries allow bikes, but I like your thinking. How about this for an adventure: Smuggle your bike onto the Copper Harbor ferry to Rock Harbor, throw your bike onto your shoulder and carry it across the island to the Windigo Landing, then smuggle it onto the ferry to Grand Portage (not Grand Marais.) I wonder if the Cycleblaze moderators would accept such a trip as a legitimate bicycle tour.
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2 months ago

Bruce LellmanTo Gregory GarceauWhat with all the smuggling the moderators would be mesmerized into realizing that it was one of the most adventurous epic bike journeys ever and would definitely accept it. Thank you for the suggestion. All I have to do now is find some shoulder padding.
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1 month ago