Dirt under the thumb nail?

Said goodbye to Andy this morning (Katie was off to work just as I was waking up). It was great visiting with him. He gave me directions to the gas station, then on to Detroit.

When we drove from Ann Arbor to their house last night I arrived with the "range" meter on my bike reading lower than I had ever run it. It said I could go 20 miles before running out of gas, but I had no idea how accurate it was at the bottom of the tank. Before I reached the station it had switched over to "low range", the reading that takes over all other displays when you go below 10 miles. I was glad to finally find a station but it seems I had a lot of fuel left in my 5 gallon tank - it took less than 4.7 gallons.

The ride into Detroit wasn't so lucky. I had originally thought that I would simply go east from Novi (where Andy and Katie live) and come out on the highway north of the city, then head north. But Andy recommended taking highway 10 right downtown, which turns into Jefferson Ave, running basically east and west. So I followed doctor's orders and went through the heart of Detroit.

As Andy had foretold, shortly after going past Joe Louis Arena there were a couple of iconic sculptures.

From there the street turned more and more desolate, signs of the typical decay of infrastructure in our inner cities. In about 8 miles the scenery changed drastically, dramatically and instantly as E. Jefferson passed into Grosse Pointe, one of the most upscale neighborhoods in the Detroit metroplex. The houses were huge, the lawns immaculate, many behind gates and walls. 

There is a house and gate in there!

Some of the houses could have provided shelter for more people than some of the apartment buildings I had just seen. With two Presidential candidates trying to promise their way to the White House I have heard no solutions offered up for the plight of our inner cities. Just like the small, small town in Arizona that I stumbled into, these are the forgotten people living here. If you can not financially impact the election, I suspect it would be very difficult to catch the ear of either candidate, with the possible exception of a photo-op at an inner city gathering spot. If someone wants such an opportunity I suggest they stop by the Big Boy restaurant on E. Jefferson and meet Dorothy or Raquel. I don't know if Dorothy is the owner, manager or a waitress at Big Boy. I don't know if she lives in the neighborhood or in Grosse Pointe or somewhere inbetween. But I know she works, probably 5, 6 or maybe even 7 days a week and knows and cares about her customers. Let me explain what happened. 

As I was riding by I spotted the Big Boy figurines and had to do a U-turn to come back for an early brunch. 

I haven't seen the iconic Big Boy in over 30 years

I don't know that I looked outwardly concerned about the safety of my bike and its contents out in the parking lot (like I was in several places along the eastern seaboard) but Raquel moved me to a table where I could "keep an eye" on it. Then when I was paying my tab Dorothy engaged me in discussing my trip. She was so sincerely interested in the story of this strange man with the wild hair that she asked, if I wasn't in a rush, if she could interview me! 

She had me sit in a booth and went to get her phone, then asked me a half dozen questions about my trip and the reason for it, so that she could record it! Then when she was done I told her I wanted to shake her hand and she replied, "oh no, you're getting a full hug". What a sweet sincere young lady, probably typical, but definitely genuine. She said I made her day, but truth be told she made my day. Andy, if you're ever down that way, stop in at the Big Boy and tell Dorothy I sent you.

From Grosse Pointe The Girls didn't know what to do to get me into "the thumb" of Michigan. They kept trying to get me onto the interstate, I kept wanting to stay on highway 29, but I kept losing the trail and they coaxed me back to anything with an "I" before it. Eventually 29 ended, I crossed a bridge in Sarnia (or thereabouts), and eventually found my way back to the waters edge on highway 25. I was half way up the thumb when I noticed that there was a layer of dark sky/air hanging over the trees ahead. As I rode I tried to figure out what it was - smoke, land in the distance, pollution? When I eventually came to a Dow Chemical plant on waters edge I was afraid I had my answer. But soon after it became obvious. It was 4:00 in the afternoon and the cool, very damp fog was just now lifting. The temperature dropped, seemingly 10 degrees, to where it was borderline uncomfortable to ride in shirt sleeves. I could feel the dampness collect on my jeans, even though no precipitation was falling onto my windshield. I could see up through the layer of fog in places and observed a blue sky. When the road turned west at the tip of the thumb the fog could be seen along the water, and when I eventually turned south again the fog went away and the temperature rose to it's previous level. I have decided the dark firmament was dirt under the Thumb Nail.

I got a geography lesson today. Lisa had requested that I take a picture of Lake Erie from the Detroit side. Sounded like a good idea until I figured out that Detroit isn't on Lake Erie! It's on the Detroit River which flows into Lake Erie. South of Detroit, across the river, is Windsor, Canada. Then comes the real eye opener. The Detroit River does not come from one of the Great Lakes (I always thought it connected Huron to Erie)! Detroit, or it's eastern suburbs, border Lake St. Clair, which despite it being a major shipping route for the giant Great Lakes freighters, is not a Great Lake (a pretty good one, but not great). Lake St. Clair separates Lake Huron from Lake Erie. I didn't know that!

As highway 25 changed from north to west to south I began looking for a motel room, thinking I would stop early. No such luck. The shore line was lined with trees and private homes but a dearth of motel/ hotels put the kabosh on an early stop. I ended up riding all the way around and back down the thumb, to Bay City, before I found anything open to the public. Maybe I could have slept on the beach but even that was fraught with difficulty as it appeared that access was restricted to residents virtually everywhere. Most of those had boat "stands" just off shore where they pulled in and lifted the boat out of the water, leaving it suspended several feet above the wake. A strange sight indeed.

You can see the dirt under the thumb nail on the horizon

I've exceeded 12,000 miles and I am definitely ready to replace the front tire (heck, I'm half way through the new rear tire already)! I'm hoping to find a dealer here in Bay City who can install the tire tomorrow so I can head out across the U.P. (Upper Peninsula) over the weekend. I should be in Wisconsin by Monday at the latest.

My favorite sign today was seen just down the road from Tom's Thumb Lumber. It pointed the way to the town of Bad Axe, home of a bunch of mean lumberjacks no doubt.