I woke at 0630 this morning, which was much later than the 0500 I had my alarm set for. I guess I needed the extra sleep. I tore down my tent quickly and laughed to myself as I pulled the branches off my bike. Last night was weird, I thought.

Not knowing quite where the sand road would lead me, I followed it anyway. The sun was on my right, so I was going roughly in the direction I wanted. The plan for the day was to keep heading north, check out the Sleeping Bear Dunes that had been suggested, and then see where I was at time-wise.

At the end of the sand hunting road I saw signs for Lighthouse State Park; sure, that sounds interesting. Basically, after a wonderful twisty road there’s a large lighthouse in the sand dunes that are the shore of Lake Michigan. It was a lovely little community of cabins along the lake and I pulled into a parking lot to hike to the lighthouse. It was a very cool, strange thing to see in what felt like a desert.





After sitting in the sand pondering this strange place for a bit, I hopped back on Mitzi and continued north. I ended up in a small town in Silver Lake State Park and decided to stop at a local diner for breakfast. The waitress was lovely and kept my coffee cup full as I sat and did some writing. There were four other gentlemen in the restaurant and I listened a bit as they regaled stories of their dune riding days. You see, Silver Lake is well known for its off-road park and dune buggies and whatnot. Very cool place.

The guys wanted a combination of a few different menu items and so they discussed possibilities with the waitress, who then discussed them with the cook. Five minutes later a new breakfast special, the 2-2-2, was created. She came over and asked to take my food order, to which I replied casually, “I’ll have the 2-2-2”. As she jots it down, I ask with a laugh, “What exactly am I getting?” Well, a bit later I ended up with a delicious plate of two eggs, two strips of bacon, and two biscuits with gravy. Biscuits and gravy was a new thing for me, and it was quite delicious!

After too many coffees, I figured it was time to start moving north again. I grabbed a few quick pictures before leaving this town. The first is overlooking the lake just in front of the diner, and the second was after playing in some sand a bit.





I hopped on the M-22 and enjoyed the heck out of it. What a beautiful highway to ride along the shore of Lake Michigan. Lots of curvy, fast, smooth sections and many lookouts over the lake.



I would highly recommend this route no matter what bike you’re on. It was a lot of fun at 60-70 mph, and I imagine it would be quite something if you were zipping along on a sport bike. Not that I condone exceeding speed limits…Just saying that those corners with a recommended speed of 35 mph were great at 75, and that’s on a dual sport tire.

I ended up at the Sleeping Bear Dunes mid-afternoon, I think, and went for a hike up a large hill. Looking out over Glen Lake below was quite something. This photo doesn’t do it much justice, unfortunately, as the sky wasn’t favoring me.



And on top of the dune:



I would have loved to rip along up there on a light 250 2-stroke, but I was stuck on my feet.

I wandered back down the dune and before getting to my bike I said hi to a gentleman walking his dog. He was real nice to talk to and gave me some valuable suggestions when he asked about my route. I had planned to continue north on the M-22 as I was loving it, and work up to the Mackinac Bridge to cross over to the Upper Peninsula. I didn’t realize that this would have just taken me on a large loop and I’d have to go back south to Traverse City before being able to go up to the bridge.

Looking at my watch, I decided I didn’t have time for this as I wanted to cross the bridge tonight. Looking at Google Maps now, I wish I had had time and ridden the M-22 up to Leelanau State Park. Oh well, just one more reason to go back to Michigan.

From Sleeping Bear I cut back south to Empire where I could hop on the 72 over to Traverse City. Once there, I went to a McD’s to check google maps and see where I was at. I don’t think I ate there, just used some wifi in the parking lot and decided to push for the Mackinac Bridge while there was still a bit of daylight.

Riding the 31 north was some more enjoyable pavement miles, and I got to the bridge with maybe 1.5 or 2 hours of light left. I knew the bridge would be long, but I wasn’t quite prepared for what I saw in front of me.

From , it is the largest suspension bridge in the western hemisphere, and the fifth largest in the world. The total length of the bridge is 26,372 feet, with the length of the suspension bridge being 8,614 feet.

There were two lanes going either way, however, there was construction in the right lane when I went across. This meant I had to ride on the steel grate that was the center lane. If you haven’t ridden on that kind of surface on two wheels before, it’s as slippery as two eels screwing in a bucket of snot. Then take into account the massive crosswind as you go across the water, and it was hairy to say the least as I was pushing myself to keep my speed up. The cars behind me (remember, down to one lane) seemed to be in a hurry and didn’t care if they were going to run me over. I obviously couldn’t stop on the bridge, so I grabbed a few photos from Google.

The whole bridge from above:



The suspension section:



The lane I had to ride on:



At the north side of the bridge you have to go through a toll booth; it was four bucks, which I had no problem paying after seeing what a massive structure it was.

I still had a bit of sunlight left, so I started west on the 2. A lovely shore road again, with the lake on my left and forest on the right. I think I rode for an hour or so before pulling off on a small road to the north to look for camp. The road turned to dirt shortly, which gave me hope. I came out to what appeared to be pasture land and found a small dead-end to the right. Well, a dead-end for cars anyway. I hopped the bike through the trees around the pile of overgrown dirt that was blocking the way, and planted my tent just on the other side.



With my kickass site I relaxed for the rest of the night drinking tea and writing. What a great day of riding it had been.

Roads
M-22 – Awesome

People
-Dude with a dog at the dune climb
-Kid wanting an 883 Sportster, 26 years old

Costs
Breakfast………………11.50
Fuel……………………...21.32
Oil…………………….......4.50
Fuel……………………...10.46
Bridge Toll…….........4.00
Total…………….………$51.78

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2006 KLR650
1976 RD400
1989 NSR250 (recently sold this gem)

Awesome post. Thanks for taking the time to share your story!

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2006 KLR650
1976 RD400
1989 NSR250 (recently sold this gem)

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2006 KLR650
1976 RD400
1989 NSR250 (recently sold this gem)

Awesome story, man! I'm totally hooked!

Ahhh - just a bike and the open road...

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Chris

2017 Versys X
1991 Suzuki TS200R

_________________
2006 KLR650
1976 RD400
1989 NSR250 (recently sold this gem)

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2006 KLR650
1976 RD400
1989 NSR250 (recently sold this gem)

Well folks, here’s the last day of my fly and ride journey from Buffalo, NY to Saskatoon, SK.

I awoke around 0800 this morning, and I wasn’t in too much of a rush to get on the road. I had around 4 hours of riding ahead of me, and although I was excited to get home, that also meant the end of this amazing journey.

I went downstairs and enjoyed the continental breakfast and coffee while I planned my route home. Colin had left earlier in the morning as he had to work. After coming up with a general plan of gravel tracks home detouring around Lake Diefenbaker, I went back upstairs and packed my duffel for the final leg.

The ambient temperature was rather pleasant this morning, however, it was already rather windy. As I got out on the road I discovered it was a direct north wind of 30 gusting 45 mph or so, and this was making the directly north journey rather exhausting. The KLR handles the highway just fine for the most part, but with these winds, Mitzi was really tasked. The wind protection leaves a bit to be desired as well.

After a short while on the highway and gravel roads to get to Swift Current, I was already sick of the wind. Alright, time to detour east around Lake Diefenbaker and have some fun. That’s what I was hoping for, anyway.

Upon turning east on a gravel road, I now had the 45mph wind hitting me directly from my left. I’ll tell you, I’ve never had a bike leaned over that far and still been going straight. Well, trying to go straight, anyway. As I leaned further and further into the pounding wind, I started sliding towards the ditch on the right side. There was no stopping it from happening, so just before going off the road, I straightened Mitzi up and rode her into the ditch with authority.

Ok, so I can’t ride any direction but north or south on gravel, and even then, the gusts would blow me around quite a bit. Well that’s lame. I guess I’ll head back to the highway and just pound out the miles north. It was roughly 2 hours north to Rosetown before the final hour east to Saskatoon. I had my headphones in and the music as loud as it would go just to hear it over the wind noise.

Honestly, I would have preferred it to be raining than this wind. It just wasn’t fun riding at all; it felt like a chore. I stopped in Rosetown for a quick bite at Subway, and to rest my strained body before carrying on for the last hour. Heading east now, I was once again leaning into the wind as hard as I could. Fortunately this time, the pavement gave me enough traction that I could stay on the road.

Somewhere between Rosetown and Saskatoon Mitzi lost power and I knew the feeling right away – out of fuel. I pulled over as I couldn’t take my hand off the bar to flip the petcock with the crazy wind. I hadn’t filled up in Rosetown because it shouldn’t have been an issue to get home on the tank from Shaunovan. Well, after fighting the wind all day, I had hit reserve at 250 miles. Over the short week-and-a-bit ownership, I had typically hit reserve just after 300 miles. I considered stopping at the next town for fuel, but I should be able to make it to Saskatoon I figured.

I had decided earlier in the morning that I wanted to get into Saskatoon before the end of the work day; I wanted to surprise my mom by showing up at her work. She was thrilled, and it was so great to see her after being gone a couple weeks. My mom isn’t always the biggest fan of the trips and adventures I go on, but she’s grown to be very accepting of me, and I appreciate her for it. I thought stopping in to say hello was the least I could do.

It felt weird to be back in my home city. It felt strangely foreign. I’m not quite sure how to describe the feeling of knowing where I was and how to get around, but…I don’t know, it just felt odd.

After the visit with my mom, I made my way home and snapped one last picture from the journey before unpacking.



This coming spring and summer will be filled with many shorter rides, I’m sure, and I will be taking off for Central and South America starting September 2014! I will for sure be writing a ride report as I go, trying to keep it as up to date as possible, unlike this one.

I hope you continue to find your own journeys in life, and share those experiences whenever possible!

Best regards,

Jason

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2006 KLR650
1976 RD400
1989 NSR250 (recently sold this gem)

It is amazing how the wind can eat up fuel!

Thanks for sharing that I really enjoyed riding along.

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The guy riding the red farkled up 08 KLR where ever the front wheel goes!

I read your report on AdvRider earlier on. A job well done, enjoyed the reading.

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I do these things not to escape life but so life does not escape me