Wolfi's fun ride in Hiawatha National Forest, Upper Peninsula, Michigan.

The plan was to ride a lot of gravel roads in the UP based on ride reports from a few ADV rider inmates. The past days and weeks it was raining a lot in the area and when I did a detour on my way to the grocery shop I got to realize that the roads might be far too wet and soft for the heavy loaded Suzi.

The following days brought a few more thunderstorms  and I became more suspicious about the conditions of the gravel roads.  Besides that, up to now I did not had a proper possibility to test the sidecar in serious gravel roads with only light weight load. This was my moment and what could be better then to visit a few water falls after heavy rain :)

SilberWolf on gravel roads.

Cute little butterfly gave me some company.

The roads had a very soft surface.

It got more and more wet ...

Then came this...

and action!

I was totally wet after those puddles and it was fun!

Wagner Falls.

Interesting history - great to have such an info stand.

With me having fun by crossing those puddles I noted at the first break that the sidecar was slightly wet from the inside. A closer look and I saw that water was everywhere :-o

Waterproof bag - no water came out!

Waterproof side car! Water level about 3cm above floor level.

No point in fixing this now... More gravel roads were coming later on this ride.

Photo shoot at Lake Superior.

This indicated what the view was supposed to be.

This was the real view of that day (No need to linger here and I even left the engine running during the time I took this picture)

Munising Falls.

Dog unfriendly set-up! What a non-sense.

It was a bit of a hike from the parking lot to the falls, "no" mosquitoes during the hike and a beautiful forest so I took a few pictures.

And here is the fun video:

Click here if you have trouble to watch the video.

My track (200km, total time 5 hours)

I considered this a fully successful ride:

• I had great fun
• Now I know, no gravel roads for us after weeks of heavy rain in that area
• The sidecar can collect a lot of splashing water when crossing puddles, fords, causeways
• I need to get a hole in the bottom of the side for quick and easy relief of the water?
• All important or sensitive stuff must be packed watertight or put somewhere else (actually this theory requires more testing!!! to see whether the dog ramp is watertight)

~ Wolfi