Take The Long Way Home

In this episode of "Mike Dell's World," titled "Taking the Long Way Home," host Mike Dell begins by ensuring the recording is set up correctly while joking about keeping his dog, Benny, from interfering. After greeting listeners with various times of day, Mike shares that he just had lunch at Burger King with Benny, who enjoyed a plain hamburger. Mike introduces the episode's topic of taking the long way home, explaining that he enjoys scenic routes rather than the quickest paths back to his house. He describes driving along Five Mile Road and discusses the area around him, including its woodlands and the slight elevations. As he drives, he comments on the beautiful weather—55 degrees and sunny—with the fall colors still visible but past their peak. As he navigates the roads, Mike reminisces about his family's history in the area, including his uncle's place from the 1970s. He mentions the names of several lakes, emphasizing the beauty and charm of taking slower, scenic routes through the Forest Lakes area and reflecting on past experiences from his childhood. Mike encounters some minor driving challenges, like getting caught behind other vehicles and needing to manage his dog's comfort with the seatbelt and windows. He shares details about a road known as Supply Road, which is popular among car enthusiasts and motorcyclists for its curves and scenic beauty. He also contrasts Supply Road with M-22, another renowned highway in Michigan, sharing anecdotes about local tourism and roadside attractions, including a t-shirt company that has trademarked the highway sign. As he nears his home, Mike discusses the significance of local landmarks like Roy's General Store, mentioning its array of products and offerings. Towards the end of the episode, Mike reflects on the seasonal changes in Michigan, humorously commenting on the challenges of construction and tourist traffic that occur throughout the year. he expresses his intention to record more mobile podcasts and hints at doing a podcast from the airport soon. As he approaches home, he remarks on the challenges of navigating traffic lights and concludes the episode by encouraging listeners to stay tuned for more. Throughout the episode, Mike creates a humorous and laid-back atmosphere while sharing his thoughts and experiences on the joys of taking the long way home.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Okay. I think it's recording.
We're gonna make sure that the dog doesn't
mess with it.
Give me a second.
There we go.
Hey. Good morning. Good evening. Good afternoon. Whatever
the case may be. This is Mike, and
this is Mike Dell's World

(00:23):
Mobile.
So
just, had lunch with the with the beagle,
Benny.
Went to Burger King. It was not a
great experience, but not bad.
And he had his plain hamburger.
He doesn't get that very often, but once
in a while, I'll take him with me

(00:44):
to lunch.
And the subject I have for today
is taking the long way.
So
Burger King is along US 31 along the
bay.
And it was just a, you know, quick
three miles maybe,
something like that,

(01:05):
between my house and there.
And that's the way we go to get
there.
But going home, I always like to take
the long way, and I do that a
lot of times.
You know, if I'm going out to my
mom's, I'll go one way,
going out, another way coming home.
There's more than one way to get there,

(01:26):
obviously.
And
I don't know how noisy this is.
Got Benny, got his head out the window.
It's kind of a nice day. It's 55
degrees and sunny,
and I'm driving up five Mile mile road
of all places. Let me,
pull off here because I don't wanna go

(01:47):
really fast, and I've got a guy guy
right on my butt, which is kinda normal.
So let me
get over here. There we go. Get back
on the road.
So, yeah, I'm going up five mile, which
is the long way. I live on three
mile,
and five mile, four mile, and three mile

(02:09):
road all
intersect with
a road called Hammond Road. And,
anyway, I like to go up this way.
It's a really,
steep hill not steep, but it's a hill.
There's a ridge, and,
I just sort of
like to go up there. I might close
that window while he's not,

(02:31):
got his head stuck out it. There we
go. That ought to quiet it down a
little. And I'm probably gonna do a little
post processing
anyway, so
we'll see how much of the ambiance
comes through or even if this recording works
at all.
But yeah. And
so, you know,
driving along here, it's through the woods and

(02:52):
uphill.
You
know, might go up
500 feet, 400 feet, something like that. Not
not too much. Because like I said, we're
kinda near the airport, so
I don't ever
feel like I'm getting too close to the
ground when I'm coming in this direction. So
it's not,
like a huge

(03:14):
rise in,
maybe I think it's three to 400 feet
is the total rise, but it's a nice
hill.
It's all, you know, heavy wooded.
And we're a little past peak here as
far as fall colors, although there's still a
fair amount of leaves on the trees, and
and, they are

(03:35):
a tad colorful,
mostly shades
of brown and yellow.
Not any reds left.
I think our peak color was last weekend
or maybe the weekend before. It wasn't
a a spectacular
year.

(03:56):
But,
again, like I said, I like to take
the long way home,
especially lunch break. You know, not much going
on.
Work from home. Usually, I just go in
the kitchen and make something. But when I
do go,
you know, I like to take the long
way. Same thing. Like I said, going
other places.

(04:16):
You know, when you really know a town,
there's multiple ways of getting to everywhere and,
you know, depending on traffic and all that.
I try to stay off the main drag
mostly.
We're really gonna take the long way. In
fact, we're gonna probably do a little backtracking
here. I'm

(04:37):
coming up to,
I think it's called High Lake Road.
I don't even remember.
Yeah. High Lake Road,
Hammond and High Lake. There's a really weird
intersection here, but
not too bad.
But,
this whole area out here is called the

(05:00):
Forest Lakes area, I think.
I don't know. I'll I'll know when I
see the sign.
But,
or
yeah. Something like that. Dog's whining
because because he thinks we're going somewhere important.
But, this whole area, you know, there's Spider

(05:21):
Lake, Arbutus Lake,
all kinds of lakes and woods, and
it's really a a neat area
to drive slowly in.
My,
family, my uncle had a place out here
back in the seventies in the woods, and

(05:43):
the house is still there.
I drive by it once in a while.
You know, it's kind of a neat
a neat area.
Again, it's nice and sunny today.
A few wispy clouds.
It's at 55 degrees.
Dog's whining because I don't have his window

(06:03):
open. I'll open it up when we get
into the woods.
And, of course, he's setting off the seat
belt thing now.
New fangled vehicles.
I'm sure I told you about it, but
I inherited my dad's
pickup truck,
which was a, 2020

(06:24):
Toyota Tundra,
and it's got a lot more gizmos and
gadgets than I'm used to.
Here we go. Benny got off
the got off the seat.
But,
and it's got a lot of gizmos and
gadgets, and one of the things, it's got

(06:45):
the you know, it'll disable the
airbags,
in the front seat if not a heavy
item there. So whenever I take the dog,
I gotta remember
to clip the seat belt.
Otherwise, the the seat belt warning will go
off.
Yeah. Sometimes when he gets on there, he's,

(07:06):
like, right on the the cusp. Oops. Let
me let his window down. We're in the
slow area now. Woah. Sorry, bud.
Anyway, then he's got his head out the
window and,
go
just cruise around a little bit here.
Go and buy a little store,

(07:26):
Cortez grocery.
When I was a little kid,
I'd ride with my dad out there. We
had a VW Beetle,
and he'd ride out here, and he'd always,
one of the my treats was stopping at,
Cortades for a yellow pop. That's what I
called it, a yellow pop. Come to find
out, it was probably mellow yellow.

(07:49):
Mountain Dew existed, but, it was in green
bottles, so I couldn't tell what color it
was. I think it was mellow yellow or
some other,
maybe Faygo,
yellow pop.
We'd always stop at Corte's on the way
back,
from my uncle's place or sometimes on the
way to my uncle's place.

(08:11):
And from our house, this was quite a
ride because we had to come, you know,
all all the way across Traverse City
and and then,
out a little further than that
to this side. So
I didn't see the sign.
Yeah. I think it's called Forest Lakes area.

(08:32):
Main
feature out here
is all the little lakes, and, you know,
there's Spider Lake, which is kind of a
well, if you look at it from the
air, it's a spider shaped. It's got a
lot of little tentacles
and bays and
coves and whatever.
And, it's kinda spread all over the place.

(08:54):
And then there's Arbutus Lake that's very similar.
And all these roads kinda twist
and and turn through the woods.
You know, think of, you know, hardwood forest
and some pine trees and and then, you
know, going close to all these little
little, coves and whatnot on the Spider Lake.

(09:16):
And then, like I said, Arbutus Lake is
similarly shaped,
although a little bigger.
You know, it's just a
a really cool place to just take a
nice little ride.
Yeah. Haven't done one of these sound scene
tour things in a while, so I am

(09:37):
way out of practice. You know, it's funny.
I was
playing with this recorder this morning trying to
figure out, well, does it still work? Does
it have batteries?
Do I need to change the batteries? Do
I need to do any of this stuff
and and just how to work it. And
then I, pulled the card on it and
looked,

(09:58):
at it. And the the last time I
recorded
anything on this
was in 2020.
So that's that's how long it's been since
I've done a either mobile or walking
podcast,
and I really don't know how well this
microphone is working.
It,

(10:19):
let's see. I guess I can look at
the meters. It seems alright.
I guess if I crank it up a
little bit
did I crank it up or down? I
don't know. We'll save it.
Audio quality on this may not be as
good as
other recordings,
but

(10:39):
who knows?
Yeah. And this is gonna end up being
kind of a long way around to get
home because, I made the wrong turn and
ended up,
I think I'm coming up on High Lake
Road again.
So I made a loop through the woods.
That's alright. I gotta get back to work,
anyway, here shortly.

(11:02):
But
just have to remember,
which way to turn. Oh, this is Supply
Road, okay
Cool. Now. I know where I'm at
Supply Roads also a kind of a unique
drive
around here
is it goes between here and a little
town called South Boardman,
and it goes through the woods and, through

(11:24):
the Boardman River Valley.
Well, not really a valley, but the Boardman
River area.
And then comes out on, US 131,
which is the
one of the major highways going, into Grand
Rapids.
So when we head south, we we don't
usually take Supply. We usually, take

(11:45):
M 113,
which is, a little further south,
and then we join one thirty one just
before it turns into a freeway.
But,
Supply Road, is real famous for,
you know, people that drive high performance cars,
you know, that handle well and

(12:06):
and,
you know, like, think think of if you're
into car videos on YouTube, The Tail Of
The Dragon
is a famous mountain road
in Tennessee that all the, you know, high
performance car drivers
like to drive the the the Tail Of
The Dragon. Well,
Boardman

(12:26):
or South or whatever. Supply Road, going from
here to
South Boardman
is kinda that for here. And and when
I used to ride motorcycles, it was real
popular to ride your motorcycle. So it's just
a whole bunch of curves through the woods,
and, you know, it's just a lot of
fun to drive. You don't even have to
go fast. In fact, it's better not to

(12:47):
go fast
because you end up in the
up end up in the trees, but it's
a challenging road.
We have another look road like this that's
become somewhat famous,
M 22.
That's, Michigan Highway 22. It goes from Manistee,
Michigan
to Traverse City, but it goes all the

(13:09):
way up and around
the Leelanau Peninsula, which, if you're looking at
the back of your hand, it'd be the
pinky finger of Michigan.
So it goes way north, and then, it
comes back 22 miles back to,
Traverse City on the other side of the
peninsula.
And that stretch between Manistee

(13:30):
and,
Northport
is pretty famous amongst
car drivers and motorcyclists
and just plain old tourists goes up through
the Sleeping Bear Dunes.
It's really quite
the quite the road. But being a Michigan
highway, you would think
it would go someplace. Well, yeah, it kinda

(13:51):
does. It ends up in Traverse City and
Manistee, you know, on either end.
But
there's really not
a lot of traffic on that road,
trying to get from a to b. You
know, they it's
it's more of a recreational road or a
tourist road,
that way.

(14:13):
And,
that one kind of made national news,
a few years ago.
And
to this day, they have to secure all
the signs on it because of it. But,
there's a local company here, a tourist trap,
selling t shirts and
and mugs and stickers and, you know, god

(14:35):
knows what.
But,
call them 22,
and they actually got a trademark on the
highway sign.
I never heard of that before, and they
actually
will sue you
if your company uses a highway sign
as their trademark.

(14:56):
So, you know, it's
I don't know. I kinda hate that.
So I sort of protest the m twenty
two company, but the road's cool.
I don't know if you ever, watch on
YouTube,
the Hagerty channel,
Hagerty
car insurance. It's a classic car and boat
insurance company based here in Traverse.

(15:19):
Anyway, Hagerty,
they're pretty famous amongst car collectors and whatnot.
And and Hagerty,
will do some some drives on their YouTube
channel along M 22.
One of the famous ones was the
they drove a,
Citroen
two CV, one of those weird little French

(15:40):
cars,
and, that was filmed on M 22.
That was from a few years ago as
well. But,
anyway, I'm, here at, 3 Mile in Hammond.
Here by Roy's General Store.
Roy's is kind of an institution around here.

(16:01):
They,
kind of an everything store. They sell
tractors. They sell hardware.
They sell groceries,
gasoline.
They work on small engines or a Husqvarna
dealer.
They just sell all sorts of stuff.
Good old Roy's.

(16:21):
And they have a really good
lunch and breakfast buffet.
You know, the food's really good.
I'll do that sometimes.
But, I was driving down three mile,
south of of my house,
and they just opened this part of the
road up after rebuilding it.

(16:43):
They made it three lanes, and
it's all fresh,
asphalt.
It's a real pain in the butt when
it was, well, excuse me, when it was
closed,
but
we got it reopened.
And, of course, you know, there's only two
seasons in Michigan really, and it's winter and

(17:05):
construction.
Although
fall is my favorite time of the year
and
November,
especially,
just because
most of the construction is done.
The snow hasn't hit just yet. Now it
could happen any day. Sometimes it happens in
October.

(17:25):
But,
and the tourists are, for the most part,
gone. There was a lot of leafers here
up until last weekend,
and people coming up looking at leaves and
doing the fall color tour.
So the restaurants were still busy. Oh,
stupid light.
I swear I get caught at every traffic
light there is.

(17:46):
That's another reason to take the long way
home
is,
less traffic lights.
But,
hey, you know, I just was thinking, here
I am podcasting
while driving.
Of course, I got a lavalier mic on.
I'm not
manipulating my phone or anything like that while
I'm doing it. So I'm just sitting here

(18:08):
talking. Well, the guys pulled up next to
me at the light
probably just thinks I'm talking on the phone.
You know, five years ago or maybe ten
years ago, that wouldn't have been nearly as
common.
And people would think you're weird sitting here,
you know, well, I don't know. I got
a dog with me, so
could possibly be

(18:30):
normal to be sitting here talking to a
dog.
Anyway,
so just going by the,
approach end of Runway 28
in at Traverse City Airport,
just across the center line.
Anyway,
the wind here is crazy today. I've been

(18:50):
listening to air traffic control, and they're calling
winds.
So 20 knots
gusting to 30,
but it's coming right down the runway. So
there are some
students out flying in it.
But,
anyway, I wouldn't fly today
just because,

(19:11):
you know, that's a lot of wind.
And,
you know,
I just assume fly when the conditions are
such that
that it's better. So, anyway, I'm just about
to pull on the driveway here. Of course,
there's a traffic
light 100 yards up the street from
my house. And

(19:31):
as of as is normal, I get caught
at it every time.
So anyway, I'm gonna probably do some more
of these mobile ones.
I I have a couple of
ideas,
for
podcasts,
mobile.
This Saturday, I'm gonna actually,

(19:53):
possibly record one from the airport.
I'll bring my mobile setup and see if
anybody wants to be a taker,
at my, EAA group, but, who knows? I
don't know what the subject is tomorrow, but
I will be back
tomorrow. But he have a good day,
and catch me later.