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Crazy Commute

Editor’s Note: The Peninsula Pulse welcomes Jackson Parr as our new summer intern. A junior at the University of Iowa with an interest in endurance athletics, Parr made his trek to the county on a bicycle and lived to tell about it.

Bicycle touring generally brings about two scenes at some point in the ride. First, you have the country road laced on a bluff between rhythmic blue water on your right and the beginning of the golden sunflower harvest over sunset on your left. You can also find yourself navigating a minefield of potholes in rush hour traffic, the side view mirror on the passing Pepsi truck close enough to touch.

My annual commute from the Chicago suburbs to Fish Creek for the summer season brought about both of these equally thrilling experiences. Many people are simply incredulous of the trek, insisting it must have been on a motorcycle, not a bike.

But most people are interested as to why this all started: as a way to improve my fitness on the bike while also providing me with the feel of bicycle touring for a cross-country trip planned within the next few years. Yet the reason I continue to do the same ride every year is to roll back through towns that the interstate strides by on the road north. You can’t taste Kewaunee’s famous custard or experience Port Washington’s East Coast feel from an exit sign. I may have a new bike for this year’s journey but the route stays the same.

The Chicago-land traffic bears less than ideal biking conditions but an early morning can beat the rush. So heading out at 6 am, I put my head down and hit the Wisconsin border before cars flooded the roads. Hitting Milwaukee by noon gave me time for a nap next to a kite shop on the water and county roads brought me all the way to Sheboygan for my overnight stay with a family friend. The second day whipped an unmatched tailwind that pushed me through the charming lakeside towns that I look forward to every year on my way north.

There are a few simple guidelines that I’ve adopted over the years. As long as that big blue lake is on my right, I know I’m headed in the right direction. It is also impossible to go wrong with any road with the name “Lake” in it: Lakeshore, Lakeview, Lakeside all promise a scenic few miles without traffic. Sheboygan dogs enjoy a good chase, Café Tlazo in Algoma offers a bottomless cup of some of the best coffee I have ever tasted, and Door County has some of the best biking roads in eastern Wisconsin. As I rolled past the Door County sign on County Road S, freshly paved asphalt with a wide shoulder carried me all the way into Fish Creek.

After 276.93 miles, 10,034 calories and a strong desire to sit somewhere other than a bicycle seat, I opened the door to a pasta spread before soon heading to bed, waking up just in time for lunch the next day; a 14-hour recovery sleep. There is not much difference between my 15-hour tour and a ride downtown for breakfast or groceries – they both draw on the importance and benefit of a commute by bicycle. I’m just a little more crazy about pushing pedals.