A Dissatisfied Trail Customer

A couple of weeks ago a lady called our office to inquire about conditions on one of our trails. It seemed that her's and one or two other families were planning a longer trip that would take several days and include our Petoskey to Mackinaw City Trail that she had noticed was “unimproved,” defined in our lexicon as consisting of railroad ballast, gravel, and natural surfaces. I explained that although I hadn’t been on that trail yet this season, it had recently been used by snowmobiles (so the right of way must have been clear) and in summer was usually “bikeable” with hybrid bikes. In fact I’ve ridden the trail many times and have always found it bikeable albeit sometimes with a little difficulty in spots.

Then on Thursday there was a message on our answering machine saying that she and her group had found the trail “horrible.” She identified the difficulties as a washout of a portion of the trail near Mackinaw City, four trees down across the trail in various places, and tall grass and weeds growing on stretches of the trail north of Alanson.

I took the last issue as not being important since the weeds don’t usually affect the trail surface; the most they can do is tickle your legs. I notified the trail owner (the DNR) of the complaints of the washout and downed trees and we’re hoping for at least some remedy.

The long-term solution of course is to improve the trail to the same standard as the North Central State Trail (Gaylord to Mackinaw City) that was surfaced with crushed limestone in 2007 to rave reviews. We’re working on it. But in the short run the question remains: is the trail bikeable? It depends on how you define the word. For me it has always been bikeable but I concede that the situation does not always remain the same. Sometimes the trail can change and so can the man.

Photo: Group riders on an indisputably "bikeable" section of the Petoskey to Mackinaw City Trail.