White Pine Trail- GR to Sand Lake

[pimpalicous]

Next weekend my wife and I are planning to to do a 60-70 mile shake down ride for an up coming tour. We had origianlly planned to ride from GR north on the White Pine Trail to the 30-35 mile point turn around and ride back. After some research I see that north of Sand lake the trail turns to gravel. Does any one have a route in the Sand lake area that uses paved roads. If so would you care to share. The wife isn't keen on the gravel option, she's a newer rider and I want to enjoy the ride not have to worry about how it's effecting her ride.

Thanks.

[owosso bob]

A good source to find good roads to ride is MDOT regional bike maps , they are color coded and we use them a lot when we do packed down touring in the state .

[Slimm]

i ride up there a lot, but i never go any further north than sand lake. I think the white pine from N Park (in comstock park) to Sand lake is 22 miles. If you go south from N Park down through riverside park to ann st to monroe south to bridge (downtown GR) it is another 4.5 i think. if you did all that round trip you'd be at 53 or so. if i was trying to get extra miles, i would do a loop at sand lake over to myers lake south to 16 mile west to shaner back north to sand lake. that would add 14 or so miles and get you pretty close. shaner is pretty good to ride, not much traffic. myers lake will have a little more traffic, but shouldn't be too bad. i would avoid 14 mile and 17 mile due to traffic

one of these days i'll trek up to howard city, i just haven't done it yet

[pimpalicous]

Thanks for the input. Between the map suggestion and Slimm's suggested route, I'm pretty sure that I can set up a greta route/ ride.