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RE: [RC] [RC] Shore to Shore...a must do - Faustina DuffyHi Tracy! Glad to hear Dani's ready to go again-she's going to be top rate, and soon, too, I bet. I'm going to have to agree to disagree with you on a few things about the ride, however.... First off, Romeo and I were invited to go to Shore to Shore with Bonnie Yoho and her hubby Bill Johnson on rather short notice, so we loaded up and decided to go as far as I felt we safely could. The scenery IS gorgeous, and the folks are great. The camps are also very nice...but I don't know if I'll ever go back to the ride. Bill and I rode together almost every day of the ride, and we had a definite goal in mind-FRIDAY at Lake Michigan! To that end, we decided we'd go as easily as we could, turtling in at 9 minutes before cut off on Wednesday...turtling in all but 1 day of the ride, actually. This is NOT a ride where it pays to turtle, however, as on 2 days the ride meeting began before I even got into camp, and everyone left to go to the "special dinner" on Thursday without even telling our group the name of the restaurant we were supposed to go to. The trails are well marked, but turnings from the trail are NOT. On Friday morning there were apparently last minute instructions (after riders had left the camp) about a 2nd "blue marked" trail that went the wrong way that very few people heard. Yep, 9 out of 13 riders confused 2 miles down the wrong loop! For those "in the know" there are apparently trail maps available for pre-purchase (we were not in the know, however). The ride manager would post his trail map the night before (Except for Thursday night-we were TRULY riding blind on Friday). There were 25 mile loops without water unless you had a REMARKABLE crew like Bonnie able to decipher the road map and pinpoint where to find you as you crossed the highway. There wasn't even an arrangement for folks without a crew to send a gear bag forward to vet holds unless they made the deal with someone else's crew. NO ONE would give an honest answer to "How long is this leg of the trail" (Most because they didn't know, others because they seemed to think that this was the magical mystery ride). Trying to get an honest feel for pacing a loop that you don't know if it is going to be between 14 or 27 miles is NOT comfortable or easy (as I said, we beat the clock by 9 minutes on Wednesday). HOWEVER, The vets were FANTASTIC (thanks again Doc Barney and Doc Rae-the advice and support to us turtles was GREAT), the trail was beautiful, the people were friendly, and yes, Romeo and I DID make ALL 5 DAYS (48 1/2 hours total riding time-we used EVERY spare minute to eat on the trail), but the greatest credit for that has to go to Bonnie for her always on the spot help (I don't know how she found us, much less magically predicted what feed the boys would crave that day and had the hay and water and feed laid out before we even made it to the vet check! Anybody wanting to do a tough ride should HIRE her to crew-she is AWESOME!!!!!) and to Bill for riding with us about 200 miles of a 250 mile trail (I think I may have to keep Bill on retainer as a therapist after this!) and helping me keep my spirits up when I was sure we would miss the cut off (and putting up with all my griping and for keeping me entertained!). Thanks to Howard and to Dave Rabe for being there to help cool Romeo down and keep my spirits up, and for being so darn much fun on the trail I have to thank Tracy and Dave again! I'll never forget that ride, but I don't know if I'll ever go back to it (I WILL, however, go and crew for Bonnie, if she goes-the debt I owe her for all of her help is incredible. I only wish I could be together as she is!). And yes, Romeo did all 5 days barefoot...we walked the SHARP gravel (they used the scree from resurfacing paved roads as road material for a lot of the last day's riding) and other than that, never had ANY trouble on those accounts! If you know you have a good crew, then get the maps ahead of time and plan out water drops, and you could probably sail through this ride, but if you are as naive as me and expect to get trail info from the ride manager, then try a different ride....But that's just my soap box-I'll never forget getting to the lake on Friday-I will never cease to be amazed at what that amazing Tiger of mine can do (almost in SPITE of me-he was ready to go even when I was worn to a frazzle-how did I get so lucky?). Faustina "Lucky" Duffy
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