I slept in. I think it was about 07:15 when I woke up for real and began breaking down camp. I hoisted my pack around 08:50 on a clear warm morning. In just a few minutes I came to the stream and found a lovely bench and probably a flat enough spot I could have used for camping (admittedly too close to the stream). I still had about 1.5 liters of water which I figured would be more than enough to get me the 10.5 miles to Petowskey so I did not even stop at the stream to snap a photo. The video I took may or may not work out (many in the “not” category).
The next few miles of trail would wind through forest crossing two-tracks and forest roads now and then. I took care not to screw up and overall did pretty well. One modest mess-up around mile 595 but I probably lost only 10 minutes. It gave me an excuse to take a break. During the morning miles on my way to Kipp Road I actually encountered people. A lady jogger and a couple mountain bikers.
While I was doing pretty well during the morning the frustrations of previous days had been mounting up. I wanted a splurge of a night. A nice bed. A stress-free few days. I decided, after a talk with my parents, to get a room at the Hampton Inn. I’d likely have to eat my Petowskey State Park campsite fee. That’s life.
A little past 12:15 I arrived at Kipp Road. From this point on I had a road walk into town. It would be an ugly road walk. The roads are only two lanes (I htink) but the traffic is frequent and zooms on by. Nothing to recommend these final few miles. At least not the first 1.5 miles or so until you get to the rails-to-trails section. By that point it was sprinkling and I had just figured out that the Hampton Inn was closer to mile marker 607.5 than the State Park at 603. I was at about 600.25.
A fellow walked up to me.
“How far is it to Wycamp Lake?”
To which I replied, “Miles and mile away.”
The fellow was Richard K. ; the gentleman who let me stay in his woodshed. He had business in Petowskey and had been hoping to track me down so he could return a left-behind water bottle. He had checked each trail register and seen that I had signed them. In fact, he had treid calling me but I never heard the phone ring as I walked down the busy road buffeted by the wind. He looked down the rails-to-trails path and saw a backpacker and figured it had to be me. It was. Instead of hiking to the State Park and then either getting a taxi to the hotel or walking abouther 7.5 miles I took Richard’s offer to drive me to the Hampton inn. What a treat. Thank you.
I have a few choices now: I can take two zero days and then be on track to get my resupply in Alba, leave Petowskey tomorrow after getting my resupply and push on to Alba, or call it a trip. I am almost certainly going to do the latter. I’ve managed over 50 miles in these 5 days and I think I will be happy with that achievement.
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