I checked weather.com to find out it would be 25 degrees for a high, and only 14 if you figured in the wind chill.  But that didn’t stop any of us from heading outside this weekend.  We were part of the brave crowd.

And it was fun.

It started with a chilly quad ride.  Normally this time of year everyone would be riding snowmobiles, but luckily for me the snow hasn’t cooperated and the snowmobile trails were a mess; I don’t own a snowmobile, so I would have had to sit at the cottage and let everyone else ride their sleds.  I do own a quad, though, so three of us took those and tore down some trails and a few of the roads, all the while taking in the awesome scenery.  I love the laws that allow us to ride all the secondary roads in the county.  It’s awesome.

The ice-cold wind was finding its way through my helmet, and the 8 layers I had on weren’t preventing it from smacking me right in the chest.  But I was still in heaven.  The trails and roads were lightly snow-covered, and the scenery was something that could only be found in North Country such as this.  It was awesome.  I ignored the icicles hanging from my nose, my frozen thumb that was operating the throttle, and drove on.  It was perfect.

After a few hours of that, we headed back to all of our families who were waiting at the cottage.  They had come in order to visit Tip Up Town USA.  Houghton Lake is a smorgasbord for anything ice or snow-related this time of year, and the annual two week festival was to provide many things for the kids to do: They rode fair rides, fed a llama that I thought might eat their clothes off, and slid down the ice slide.  Honestly, the ice slide was one of the highlights of the trip – If you could have only seen the smiles on the kids’ faces as they slid down that thing – all bundled up in snow pants and winter coats – with a grin on their face all the way to the bottom.

The adults had a good time, too.  I loved watching the kids experiencing everything, including my little Abby who looked somewhat like the I-can’t-put-my-arms-down kid from A Christmas Story; she was so bundled up I’m not sure how she managed to fall asleep in her stroller through most of the experience.

I even managed to do something that most of the group was amazed by:  walk on the ice.  I hate ice fishing, and I hate standing on the ice; it is just a strange feeling for me.  But when there are vehicles out on the ice, I figure it’s safe to step on out.  Jeff relished in the moment and managed to capture a few pictures for proof.  Heck, it was so much fun, if the weather cooperates; I might even ice fish with him this weekend on a local lake.

Cabin fever tends to settle in for a lot of people this time of year, but I’m glad that hasn’t happened to any of us.  There is just something invigorating and refreshing about being outside………..even if you have to wear 8 layers to stay warm.

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As I have eluded to in my previous quad posts, the trails we have ridden so far haven’t really been ideal trails…..not in my eyes anyway.  The trails we’ve been riding have been very narrow, and very precarious at times, and that doesn’t provide much time to relax and actually take in the scenery;  if you look up for a minute you could miss a stump in the trail, a large rock, or two trees that are too close together.  And while the recent trails have had their good moments, with the few incidents we’ve had on the trail so far, I wanted to find a trail system that was wider, and provided a little bit more enjoyable trip.

Because of that I started to look around at all the Michigan ORV trail systems.  I wanted to find one, or even a few, that would provide all the qualities we are looking for.  That is when I found the Little Manistee Trail.

The Little Manistee Motorcyle Trail and Route is actually just a little north of where we fly fish for salmon and steelhead.  It is located not very far from Wolf Lake, and the Wolf Lake Lodge, which is a lodge that we’ve stayed in on quite a few occasions.  Once I found all of this out, I started to think that maybe I had found the quad trip of dreams – a trip that would allow us to stay in a lake-front room and fish that lake if we choose; it would also allow us to fly fish in the morning, and take a quad trip in the afternoon; and best of all, it is an ORV route that is made wide enough for trucks….and it’s groomed.  The trip was starting to sound better and better by the minute.  Throw in the fact that if we took this trip in the fall we could Salmon fish, and ride the trails during the color change, and it makes it sound almost unheard of.

Currently this trip is in the works, and I’m hoping that it becomes reality.  It is hard, though, because  although I’m not trying to rush the year along, our weekends are running out already, and deer season will be here before you know it.

This Little Manistee route has everything you could ever hope for in a quad trip:  nice large luxurious quad trails, trails that provide ample opportunity to take in the scenery, an excellent trail location, and close proximity to our fly fishing river.  Perfect!

Hopefully it actually happens.

Here’s a little video, for those of you who want to see, that actually shows what the trails look like.  Enjoy!

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Memorial weekend was our last quad trip and, as some of you may remember, the trip ended abruptly when my brother’s wife broke her arm.  The guys of the group still managed a short trip the next day after that incident, but we still were on a mission to take a real quad trip.  And this weekend that finally happened.

We started off on a trip that should’ve been approximately 35 miles, but after one missed turn it wound up being a  5 1/2 hour 47 mile marathon.  And what a trip it was.

On this trip we saw a little bit of everything:  bear tracks, horse crap, one heck of a logging setup, and more pumping stations for oil than I ever imagined were actually back in these out-of-the-way places.  We navigated through some trails that,  because of erosion, were probably 2 foot deep, and we managed to navigate the quads down one hell of a steep ravine that existed on the trail as well; it was incredible.  If only there would have actually been an area where we could’ve stopped and taken a picture; it was gorgeous at the top.

The trip wasn’t without a couple of mishaps, but at least this time there were no injuries (always wear your safety equipment).  My wife decided to show boat (sarcasm) a little bit, and has a nice bruise on her leg as evidence.    Thankfully, though, it hasn’t deterred her off-roading spirit, and she still loved every bit of the trip.

Overall our first real quad trip was a success, and honestly quite a bit of fun.  It would have been a touch more enjoyable if – knowing that we would be gone for so long – we would’ve had brought a lunch with us.  And I still believe, that if our quad trips had a destination, they would be a little more enjoyable as well.  Right now we pretty much just trail ride from one point for awhile, and then ultimately end up right back at the place we started – which wouldn’t be so bad if there was a fishing hole, or a camping spot, somewhere in the middle.  Hopefully we plan a trip like that real soon.

We are going to work on those things for the future, but for right now it was one heck of an experience, and quite a bit of fun.

I can’t wait for the next trip.

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Jeff eluded to this in his post a few days ago, but since I was not feeling well, writing a long post wasn’t really in the cards at that point in time.  Now that I’m back to my old self, though, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, and enjoy a story that takes us down a broken arm trail.

It was Memorial Weekend, and if I had one goal in mind, it was to take our quads Up North and break in a few ORV trails.  After buying them a couple of months ago,  I figured I might as well make the payment worthwhile.  On Friday, the start of the Memorial Day Weekend, the wife and I loaded up the quads and met a few of our other family members at their cottage near Michigan’s own Higgins Lake.

We left feeling very spunky, and looking forward to a weekend that the wife and I aren’t very accustomed to – a weekend with no little Abby, and no dog to take care of.  It was a weekend that dreams are made of, and then Saturday happened.

After a killer breakfast, and finishing some minor work that needed to be done to the cottage, we all geared-up and got ready for our inaugural quad trip.  The ride to the trail head was uneventful, and actually quite enjoyable.  Upon reaching the trail head, however, things started to change.

All of us were putting along, and had only ridden a couple of miles, when my brother’s wife decided to get out of riding the trails by throwing herself off of her quad.   Okay, so maybe she hit a stump that threw her off the quad, but I’m sticking to my story, and telling all of you that she was trying to sabotage our whole quad trip, and officially resign as our daycare provider at the same time.  I mean, seriously, she could have just said I don’t want to ride quads or watch your kid anymore – she didn’t have to throw herself into the air and break an arm.  I think that was a little overkill.:)

I was the one lucky enough to watch this whole event unfold, and I’m honestly still not sure what happened.  I think that the rear tire of the quad caught the stump just right, and into the air went Evil Knievel sister- in-law.  She apparently has to work on her landings, though, because the result of the air show was a broken right humorous bone.  She went in yesterday to have a titanium rod put in place, and hopefully in a few weeks she’ll be all healed up, and ready for another quad ride……or maybe not!

In all seriousness, though, I can’t say enough about wearing helmets and proper safety gear while riding ATV’s.  Even though we were at very low speeds, it still didn’t take much for a thing like this to happen.  And despite the broken arm, if she wasn’t wearing a helmet things could have been far worse than they were.

After spending the rest of Saturday night in a few different emergency rooms, the boys of the group did manage to get a few miles in on the trails.  We covered approximately 25 miles on Sunday, and had a great time doing it.  Of course my wife couldn’t join us because her new quad – the one with only 50 miles on it – had a problem.  Lets just say that leaking gear oil out the main rear seal isn’t a great thing.  Thankfully it’s under warranty, though, and we’ll be getting it fixed here in the next week or so.

If I learned anything from the weekend, it was this:  quad riding makes you dirty.  I never imagined the amount of filth that would acquire on one’s body from riding those trails.  The dust was everywhere – on me, on my quad, in my mouth.  Take a look at the picture.  Do I not look like I just stepped out of a coal mine?  It was ridiculous, and I can’t wait to do it again (with a filter in my helmet this time, so that I can actually breathe).

The weekend wasn’t a complete bust, and hopefully by the time you read this the sister-in-law will be out of the hospital, and getting ready to heal up that arm.

A Memorial Day weekend, that was definitely memorialized in all of our memories.

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Very shortly, we will be heading Up North to enjoy some of Michigan’s beautiful wilderness……….on ATVs.

After the wife and I purchased our quads a few months ago, and after my brother purchased one from a family member as well, it is now time for all of us to head up, and do our first trail ride.  Michigan has an abundance of ORV trails, that are kept up by the MDNR, and we are looking forward to leaving some tracks on a few of them.

Our first ride(s) is going to be on the West Higgins Lake trail.  This trail is near one of my cousin’s cottages, and can be accessed right from there.  It should be a great time.  We are planning on taking a short ride one day, and if things go well, we are going to take a longer one the next day.

I’m looking forward to the moment we can roll into a little town on the quad, hop off, and stroll into a local cafe for a bite to eat.  The experience of seeing Michigan’s wilderness on the ATV, is going to be awesome.  Honestly, I hate to think of the great wilderness we’ve been missing all these years because we didn’t have quads.  There are so many attractions, and things we’ve been missing out on, because we were driving past them on the highway, and not enjoying them up close and personal on the quads.

The only downside to the whole ordeal is that a lot of time will be spent getting things together for the trip.  And with that always comes a little stress.  At the same time, though, getting ready definitely adds to the anticipation;  and that is what these trips are all about.

One night this week we are going to take the quads out for a little run – just to make sure that they are running smooth before our expedition.  Then they will be put away, for only a few days, in preparation for the upcoming trip.

It’s too bad we can’t convince Jeff to take his new camera along, and film some of our ATV-ing adventure.  Now that would be pretty cool.

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