SummerTour Recap
Days before SummerTour, Michigan’s Thumb had dense, awful smoke from Canadian wildfires. Right before SummerTour, rain deluged camp, roads and destinations. For five days during SummerTour, the weather was wonderful, glorious and fabulous. The day after, hot, humid rain came.
SummerTour is three bicycle tours in one.
- Roads, routes and maps enjoyed wide shoulders, light traffic and tremendously courteous drivers. Aside from pulling away from Lake Huron, the roads were smooth and had great visibility forward and behind.
- Park and Ride start points were small port towns around the Thumb: Port Hope, Pointe Aux Barques, Port Austin. Inland towns were cute and quaint: Bad Axe, Ubly and Ruth.
- Ride Your Own Story went all over.
Out of 197 riders, 27 were children aged 3 to 17. The 3-year-old pedaled 9 miles while grownups kept the group together and stopped traffic at intersections. The teenagers completed single-day personal records of 55 miles and more on some days. They rode their own stories going to beaches, swimming in Lake Huron and most days rode for ice cream.
Dinner menus included roast beef, salmon, salad, grilled vegetables, prime rib, turkey, stew, lasagna, staffed cabbage, vegetarian choices and desserts. Breakfast menus listed ten different items plus coffee 30 minutes beforehand.
Twenty riders were volunteers for different things: committee, camp hosts, mechanic, SAG, check-in, map-making, route review and gear-hauling. Tri-County Bicycle Association is an “all-volunteer” organization. Especially given a shout-out to our tour director, Ginger Royston. It takes 14 months to put on an annual tour. Ginger’s committee is already two months into planning SummerTour for 2027. It’ll be a blast. You’ll like it.