Day 28 – Bruce Crossing, Michigan (Friday, May 29, 2015)

I set out to make Kenton, Michigan (that unknown state to the east).

I had lunch in Wakefield (the first real town in Michigan) at a place recommended by a variety store at the west end of town.  Wakefield was important because I had to leave highway 2 and head off across the Michigan’s Upper Peninsula via highway 28.    I was anticipating this all morning.  However when I finished my lunch I had forgotten completely about the fork and continued along highway 2.

I would have travelled along highway 2 for a long time – perhaps all day – if I hadn’t been interrupted shortly after leaving Wakefield by a driver of a car who was interested in talking to me as a rode – of all things.  He drove next to me at my speed opened the passenger window and commenced to carry on a conversation while we were travelling down the highway.    Well that wasn’t going to work for long so we stopped.   He was interested in my ride because his parents were setting out on their own trek from Portland Oregon to Maine on a custom made tandem recumbent.   (I have never seen one.)   We exchanged stories and as we were departing I told him I was heading to Kenton today.    He pointed out that if I was going to Kenton I was on the wrong road.   When there you go.   There was a benefit in conversations after all.

I corrected my course by heading back the short distance to Wakefield and made my way along highway 28.

I approached Bruce Crossing the town just west of Kenton just as it was starting to rain.  Bruce Crossing was a real town.  It was small but it had everything people needed; a coop, gas stations and a camp ground.   I  asked, as I have become accustomed, “what’s available in Kenton?  Is there a camp ground there?” etc.  It turns out that there is nothing really in Kenton so I ate supper in a sketchy restaurant, passed on the beer because the pub area was too dark and pitched my tent in the rain at a park behind the coop at Bruce Crossing.   I mentioned in one of my texts that there is a certain comfort tenting in the rain.   The rather soothing sound of rain on the tent makes for a good sleep.   After all, the rain is really the reason you have a tent and my new Big Angus , by the way, performed beautifully.