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For the last two days, my breakfast has been made up of fruit and pastries
furnished as part of the conference, but today I have to buy my own. Good
luck put one of the city's top rated breakfast spots just up the road from
my motel and even on my planned path. As soon as I walked in, I knew
Sophia's House of Pancakes would have the good
sausage, and they did.
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In addition to US-35, I knew of two other roads with end points in
Michigan. I was not planning the seek out the northern terminus of US-421,
but I was happy to snap a picture when I passed it about a half-mile north
of Sophis's.
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I did seek out the northern terminus of the
Historic
Michigan Road. It connected the Ohio River and Lake Michigan in the
early nineteenth century. Today the last mile or so of what was once the
Michigan Road is overlaid by US-12. The old road ended where the
intersection is in the first picture. The modern Michigan Road
distinguishes itself from other named highways by having a power plant on
one side of its former end point and a skateboard park on the other.
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I'm 100% certain that I passed through the US-35 northern terminus; I'm
not 100% certain where I did it. Until 2009, US-35 ended at US-12. That
intersection now has a "TO 35" sign, which I failed to
photograph, pointing down Michigan Boulevard. I've included the Michigan
Road sign because it is the first I noticed. I strongly suspect that I
missed one or more. This one is about 3 1/2 miles south of US-12 on
Michigan Boulevard.
US-35 now officially ends at US-20. That would seem to be where it takes
off toward La Porte in the third photo. But the sign assembly in the
second photo is almost two miles north of there. Maybe it's just left
over from the days when 35 went all the way to 12 or maybe not.
An article at US
Ends indicates that it really is as confusing as it seemed.
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These two courthouses do look similar but the first is in La Port (La
Port County) and the second in Winamac (Pulaski County).
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I encountered the first of the day's two detours between Kokomo and Gas
City. It was well behaved and fairly short, and caused me to miss only
about four miles of US-35. Gas City gets its name from the natural gas
that was discovered there in 1887. Street signs shaped like derricks
reinforce the gas theme.
The day's second detour occurred at IN-1 a little west of the town of
Economy. It was not, in my opinion, well behaved. It caused my to miss
some eighteen miles of US-35 and was a big part of my ending the day where
I did. I'm guessing there are guidelines about US route detours that
involve using other US routes. This detour started with a four mile run
back north to US-36. It then used eleven miles of US-36 to get to US-27
and a dozen miles of US-27 to reconnect with US-35.
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I'd actually been thinking about stopping at the
Golden Inn and
the irritation of the detour helped with the decision. The bird house is
across the parking lot from the motel office and I imagine that area is
the setting for some of Lea Ann Golden's bird photos. The wagon filled
with pumpkins is at the big produce stand on the other side of
US-40/National Road. The little orchard is at the east end of the motel.
Jeff Golden told me what's growing there but my memory's horrible and so
is my ability to identify trees. I know that there are pecan, walnut,
peach, and cherry trees and that there are some berries near the small
creek that runs through the property.
Maybe you noticed the absence of motel pictures. The only photo that
includes any part of the motel is one I took of the car to make a point of
it being a gorgeous top-down October day. That's an oversight. The absence
of an interior shot is intentional. I've stayed here multiple times and
posted interior shots in the past. Since the room was as clean and
comfortable as ever and looked basically the same, I decided I didn't
need a new collage. Apparently I've thought the same things on other
visits since the most recent interior view I can find is
from 2008. Yes, the basics
are the same but there are updates like refrigerators and flat-screen TVs.
A more recent view would be good. Next time.
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