Michigan

I'm sitting in the Chicago airport in a haze of jetlag, waiting to board my plane to Allentown, so I apologize if this is incoherent.
Brian and I spent the weekend in Traverse City, Michigan, with his brother and his wife. I don't have much time to write but Saturday we spent riding 14 miles of awesome singletrack on the North Country trail. This trail runs from New York to North Dakota and has been in the works since 1986. It was great to get out and do some biking in new scenery. The trail was not very technical but did have alot of climbing and descending. We had fun trying to clear the too close for comfort trees and getting over the many speed bumps. Small logs placed across the trail so that just as you would start going fast downhill you'd have to slowdown to safely clear them. I thought I might use my new bunny hopping skills, but the trail was too narrow and some parts had steep drop offs, and frankly my hops tend to be sloppy.

Yesterday we rented Canoes. Brian and I in one canoe, Kevin and his wife in another, we floated down the Platte River for about seven miles. Before we got in the water, Brian mentioned that he had a "merit badge" from boy scouts in Canoe paddling and therefore he should sit in the back of the boat and steer. Okay, so I let him have his fun for awhile and then said I wanted to try controlling the boat. So we very carefully switched places and I was in control. Steering a canoe is not as easy as it looks. The river was pretty narrow and the water was fairly low. Branches and trees in tangled webs scattered the banks and jutted out into the middle of the river. I successfully navigated my first few turns and then took one turn too wide, while getting Brian and the front of the boat wedged underneath a large tree. Brian yelled out, "I'm not gonna make it!" (under the tree) and we slowly tipped our boat and all of our stuff into the 55-ish degree water. Included in that stuff was my camera (hence no pictures) and my cell phone (don't try to call me). Now soaking wet, we quickly got to shore and emptied the boat of the water, while noting that today would not be the day that I earned my merit badge in canoing.