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Published: December 22nd 2009
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Now to clear up any possible confusion about going to the Gay Bar. I haven't decided to go over to the other side. The sledders who ride up here know that the Gay Bar is just that: the bar in the town of Gay, MI. Gay is a tiny town that once had one of the many copper mines in the Keweenaw Peninsula. It's located on the eastern side of the peninsula right on Lake Superior.
We received a couple of inches of snow in the morning and the trails were in perfect condition. The groomers were out on almost every trail and the trails were as good as they get. There were a lot of snomobilers here over the weeekend and I was concerned that they would have beat up the trails, but the groomers did a great job. I left Hancock and rode through the towns of Dollar Bay and Lake Linden on Trail 3 then took Trail 122 to Gay. It's a ride of about 35 miles from Hancock to Gay.
As I arrived at the black shale shore of Lake Superior, a couple of sledders pulled up. They were Jim & Debi from Independence, MN
Jim & Debi
In front of one of their brand new Polaris snowmobiles. and they were riding brand new matching Polaris turbo 4 stroke snowmobiles. Jim is the owner of the Ox Yoke Inn restaurant in Independence, MN, about 35 miles west of the twin cities. After a couple pictures, we rode to the the Gay Bar for lunch. Jim and Debi are avid snowmobilers and do almost all of their riding in the western UP and Keweenaw. A lot of snowmobilers from Minnesota ride here. There hasn't been a tremendous amount of snow in Minnesota in recent years so they make about a 5 hour drive from the Twin Cities to ride here. Sure beats my 7-1/2 hour drive here. They were very nice people and it was a pleasure to shoot the breeze with them over lunch. They decided to ride north to Lac LaBelle toward Copper Harbor and I headed northwest to Phoenix and the Cliffview Inn. On the way to Phoenix, the trail crosses Hwy 41 where the Keweenaw snow meter is located. the meter tracks snowfall for the period on 1957-2005. They do get a ton of snow here. the record snow was in '78-'79, 390 inches, over 32 feet. The average snowfall is 240 inches-20 feet! The
Jim & Debi
At the beach. lowest total was in
'99-'00, still 161 inches. Lake Superior is a heck of a snow maker.
I finished my ride back to Hancock on Trail 17, one of the many railroad grades converted to snowmobile trails. These are fairly straight, high speed trails and you can cover a lot of miles riding them. The loop I rode was right around 100 miles. I got back to the Ramada around 7:30. I had dinner there and about 9:00 a guitar player started playing. He was a young guy named Bob and he played the blues and had a great blues voice. I got to hear a couple of Stevie Ray Vaughn songs played and sung really well. It was a nice end to the day.
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Jan
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Glad You're Having A Good Time!
Wow, Bob, your wife surely is a keeper! The week of Christmas and you are up in Michigan having a GAY ole time. Glad the trails are good and hopefully when you return to Orland Park the house will mysteriously be transformed into Christmas! Continue to stay safe while having fun. PS. The Tree is finished!!