Completed Counties Archives - Page 15 of 17

August 1, 2020September 4, 2023

Alpena

Alpena County Run

You will notice that I don’t have a Strava record for this run. I had to enter it in manually because I wasn’t getting any phone service at this location.

What I decided to do was set my timer on my phone and run for at least 20 minutes out and then 20 min back. That way I would be sure to do, at least, the proper distance. I’m not 100% sure it was 3.2 miles but I do know it was at least 3.1 miles.

This was our swim in Lake Huron the night before. Notice how far the people are away from us. It was nice to keep our distance during this Covid time.

Shot of the Fietcher Pond is a super big lake. This was taken the night before the run.

Same picture first thing the next morning. The beginning of my run.

This was the start of the road. Was cool that I met up with our camping neighbor, he was walking his dog and returning as I was leaving.

A lot of these pictures were more for the fact that I wasn’t getting service out here and I wanted to make sure I had record of what each turn looked like. There were a lot of turns.

Further down the road. I wanted to do a loop, but I was afraid of getting lost without a way to contact my wife back at the camp. So I ended up doing an out and back.

Another shot of the gravel road, but it was cool to have my shadow in this shot.

Back at camp and my wonderful wife and grandchild had breakfast cooked. Boy was I spoiled.

After staying the night in Oscoda County, we decided to head towards Lake Huron. We ended up finding a place to stay on the West side of Alpena County. We were looking for something that would be enjoyable for Melody, but my phone was not getting service in the part or the state. Was frustrating, but we did find the campground/fishing hole. Jacks Landing was a cool little place to camp. We set up our tent and did a couple things then we went east, to the town of Alpena. With the purpose of swimming in Lake Huron with Melody. Was great.

Alpena County

Alpena
Green
Hillman
Long Rapids
Maple Ridge
Ossineke
Sanborn
Wellington
Wilson

Any place in Bold and Red are townships / towns / cities I’ve run a 5k for the county run (or the closest city to my county run)

Any place in Bold and Blue are townships / towns / cities I’ve run anytime in the past.

Any place in Bold and Green are townships / towns / cities I’ve done website / hosting / design work – best website builder for small business – WordPress design hosting and search engine optimization. I’m a small business website builder – contact me to get a website that works! If no Green color is on this page, please talk with me (Click Here). I’ll be encouraged to change one to Green!

July 31, 2020September 4, 2023

Oscoda

Oscoda County Run

This was the crew for the weekend! Myself, Lisa and Grand-daughter Melody. We stayed at Big Bear Campground. It was nice and partially filled but LOTs of space between camp sites. We were always about 30 yards away from others.

This was the start of my run. But it shows how busy the campground was, a huge bonus for us.

Early on I met up with this fellow. He had a mouthful of something.

Another view of Big Bear lake. Beautiful little place.

Just outside of the campground running east, I think.

Most of this run was on dirt roads, with almost no houses. This was a very rural area.

Did like seeing all kinds of deer track and listening to the birds and wildlife first thing in the morning.

This was a fairly flat run, this area opened up a bit, but most of the run was pretty covered with trees and scrubs.

Loved the look of the field on one side of the road and the forest on the other.

A Strava friend (and previous co-worker) Genevieve Lyon often takes pictures of flowers along her hikes/rides… I was inspired to do the same when I saw these flowers.

This was the end of my 5k and I was super close to the campground. I got an idea to try to find the other end of a trail that lead right to my campsite…

….after following a path for about a quarter mile, I looked at the map on my phone it was clear to me that I took the wrong path. So I reset my Strava and did a walk back to the campsite.

It was initially my plan to go to Lake Huron and run Iosco County. This is during the COVID scare in late July and that county was getting a lot of infections as the above map illustrates. And because we were taking our grand-daughter with us, we decided to hit the more northern counties. We also hit campgrounds that were not tight or filled with campers. It seemed to work well for us. So we hit Oscoda county first and it was great to see this area. It was the first time for all three of us. I think I’m going to like the fact that this goal will make me explore places that I’ve never been. Hopefully this Covid pandemic will be over during the completion of this goal. It most likely will be as this will take several years to complete.

Oscoda County

Big Creek
Clinton
Comins
Elmer
Fairview
Greenwood
Loon Lake
Mentor
Mio

Any place in Bold and Red are townships / towns / cities I’ve run a 5k for the county run (or the closest city to my county run)

Any place in Bold and Blue are townships / towns / cities I’ve run anytime in the past.

July 27, 2020September 3, 2023

Charlevoix

Charlevoix County Run

This was my first glimpse of Deer Lake from the drive.

Started seeing the lake past a couple houses. What a beautiful lake.

Nice house being built, I think this was on the south west side.

This was another great view of the lake.

The last mile of this journey was walked. I recorded it separately.

There was a park on the south west side of the lake.

This was probably the coolest shot on the south side of the lake.

wonderful sunset on the drive back home.

This county wasn’t planned much at all. I decided to do a close county just to get another one complete. I didn’t really have any idea where to go but I found this lake that was about 4 miles around. I have found that running around rivers and lakes are nice because they are mostly at the same elevation. So this is mainly why I choose this spot. East Jordan would have been nice to explore as I’ve only been there once or twice in my life. This county was the first time I thought to myself, “what have I done planning this goal? – I hate driving!” I’m guessing I will have MANY many more of these thoughts soon enough, as I’m only about 10% done with this challenge.

Charlevoix County

Bay
Boyne City
Boyne Falls
Boyne Valley
Chandler
Charlevoix
East Jordan
Evangeline
Eveline
Hayes
Hudson
Marion
Melrose
Norwood
Peaine
South Arm
St. James
Wilson

Any place in Bold and Red are townships / towns / cities I’ve run a 5k for the county run (or the closest city to my county run)

Any place in Bold and Blue are townships / towns / cities I’ve run anytime in the past.

July 21, 2020September 3, 2023

Leelanau

Leelanau County Run

Started this run feeling pretty good, a little exhausted from my previous two runs, because I hit it pretty hard those last couple. Loved the farm country at this part of the county. I’ve never been to this part of the county. All over the rest but not here. Loved seeing all the corn.

First part of the run was all up-hill not bad but long and continuous.

After I turned the corner on this photo above I was surprised that it just continued up…

This was the creek on the south side of the path.

Northwest section of the run had this park.

Not sure why I took this photo. Just remember cutting, splitting, and stacking a lot of wood as a kid.

Much of the end of the run was re-paved and the machines used to do the road work were right at the end of my run. What a great day/run.

I have in the past run a 5k in Leelanau, but not often and mostly the lower part of the county, just outside of Traverse City. My buddies at Byte Productions have hosted a 5k for the past several years Called the Blue Ribbon Run. It is in memory of their dad Curt Barrons and it benefits the local chapter of Us TOO, a prostate cancer education and support group.
The very first year it was hosted by their office in Leelanau County, but the event moved into Traverse City once they moved their office.

I also used to work for Matheson Greens and North Country Gardens through a company called Peninsula Management Group out of Northport. I have run once in Northport from the High School around town. I think I was rock climbing at the gym that day. But there are so many great places in this county Empire, Glen Arbor, Leland, Suttons Bay, and even Maple City. I used to live in Interlochen and drive through Maple City to get to work in Northport.

My son and I have gone to North Manitou Island for a weekend and I’ve always wanted to take my wife to South Manitou… Maybe this would be a great reason to go there. Not sure if there is a route that would be a 5k (without repeating) but it would be fun even if I did have to repeat trail.

**Well, I didn’t do this, just came a day when I wanted to check a county off the list that was close.

Leelanau County

Bingham
Centerville
Cleveland
Elmwood
Empire
Glen Arbor
Kasson
Leelanau
Leland
Northport
Northport
Solon
Suttons Bay

Any place in Bold and Red are townships / towns / cities I’ve run a 5k for the county run (or the closest city to my county run)

Any place in Bold and Blue are townships / towns / cities I’ve run anytime in the past.

July 19, 2020September 3, 2023

Benzie

Benzie County Run

Hope Cantrall (friend from Benzie High School) and I meeting up for this run. I’ve stayed in contact with her through the years, but haven’t seen her face to face since 1989! She lives out of state now but was visiting her old hometown so good to see her in person again.

The start of our run looking at Crystal Lake.

There is a nice path that goes along the shoreline.

We had planned on starting this Run at 7am, but there was a HUGE thunderstorm. We didn’t start this run until about 9:30am… The trail had some wet spots for sure!

We saw this statue across the water on the run. This was my shot of it…

This was Hope’s shot. It’s obvious to me that I need to work on getting better pictures on these 5k runs!

Was cool seeing the steam above the trees, across the Lake.

Post run shot. Thanks for joining me Hope!

Hope’s pace is much faster than mine so I appreciate her running slow with me, but this was pretty fast for me. My short-term goal is to get back to running 10 min miles, so I can complete 5k’s in about 30 minutes.

I had thought of this county a few times before I did it. Thinking maybe I should run by my houses (3 different locations), maybe a run by my school, maybe by my families areas, or possibly a run by the Betsie River and Crystal Mountain, as I’ve ran several half marathons there…

But after talking to Hope and hearing that she would be visiting Beulah, I decided that it would be cool to run with a runner from high school. There are a lot of others that I went to high school with that may live in an unfinished county… Let me know if you have a county that I should do and please do your county with me!

Benzie County

Almira
Benzonia Benzonia
Beulah
Beulah
Blaine
Colfax
Crystal Lake
Elberta
Frankfort
Frankfort
Gilmore
Homestead
Honor
Inland
Joyfield
Lake
Lake Ann
Platte
Thompsonville
Thompsonville
Weldon

Any place in Bold and Red are townships / towns / cities I’ve run a 5k for the county run (or the closest city to my county run)

Any place in Bold and Blue are townships / towns / cities I’ve run anytime in the past.

Category: Completed Counties

Alpena

Alpena County

Oscoda

Oscoda County

Charlevoix

Charlevoix County

Leelanau

Leelanau County

Benzie

Benzie County

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