GOAL REACHED, ON TO THE NEXT........Detroit

SATURDAY

Saturday was a "casual day as we stayed a mile from the ferry and had the morning free as we didn't sail until 1:30pm. After breakfast  it was time to get a weeks worth of grime off of our bikes. It is always interesting that the hotels are more than happy to provide the use of their hose and housekeeping can usually be counted on to provide old towels for our use. Make it a lot easier than having to carry wet towels and rags.
As soon as we started there was a torrential down pour! Fortunately we were under the canopy in front of the hotel but it is always a good opener for a conversation with other customers when you are washing the motorcycle while it is pouring.
After washing and organizing the bikes it was off to check out the local dealer. We do that a lot and one would think it is the same from dealer to dealer but there is always something unique that we have not seen before. This time I found a pair of waterproof gloves that I have been looking for and Kim got a neat pair of Harley sneakers. Cherif didn't hold up his end cause he didn't buy anything! The other thing that we always look for is 'Dealer Chips"  Most dealers have poker chips with their name on them and it is fun to collect them from each dealer that you visit. I have a drawer full from my travels and a bunch of new ones from this trip.

The calm before the storm(look in the distance)

#-4 foot waves really rocked the boat

After getting our to go lunch at Subway we boarded the boat. Normally we find ourselves waiting in line to board but this time we were ushered directly into the hold which was nice. The crossing was rougher than normal with a lot of movement on the boat and a lot of passengers with a green tinge to them. Fortunately none of us were affected and we weathered the storm well. One thing that we normally do is to plan ahead for our hotel rooms early but today we didn't as we hoped to ride out the day when we got back. Unfortunately, we could see that there was a storm coming AND quickly found that there were no rooms in the area, the closest being in Muskegon, some 70 miles away. We high tailed it south and almost made our hotel but with 3 miles to go we got soaked with a blinding rain. What a way to end our day..........

SUNDAY

Sunday morning dawned crisp, clear and cool, a great day to ride. We immediately headed for the coast to complete our goal of traveling around the outside of the state. Unfortunately, along this route our views of the lake were few and far as most of it is residential. When we were able to stop at a local park, it was really windy and the lake was churned up into some pretty big whitecaps. Eventually we got to New Brooklyn and then headed east on Route 12. We had the option of making it a quick trip to Bloomfield Hills outside of Detroit where Cherif lives but decided on this route which proved to be a really nice, quiet ride with very little traffic until we reached suburban Detroit. We were treated to some great hospitality by Cherif and his wife, Linda. A really good home cooked meal with good friends and some comfortable accommodations, what more could one ask for at the end of a long day of riding?

Amazing what you see on the road sometimes