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September 3, 2002Leelanau trek offers shorter routeBy PATRICK SULLIVANRecord-Eagle staff writer GLEN ARBOR - After the grueling 0.3-mile trek over this Leelanau County bridge, many of the Labor Day bridge walkers caught their breath, ate a hot dog, turned around and walked back. Among the walkers was Rep. Dave Camp, who said he decided to come to the walk for the first time this year because he is running for Congress in a district that has been redrawn to include Leelanau County. "And I figured I could get across," joked Camp. The walk, over a tiny bridge that separates Glen Lake from Little Glen Lake, is in stark contrast to the five-mile bridge walk over the towering Mackinac Bridge. Camp sported one of the custom-designed Glen Lake bridge walk T-shirts, a different version of which has been on sale every year since 1996, a year after the first bridge walk started as a reaction to the Mackinac Bridge walk. Bill Thompson owned an ice cream parlor at the end of the bridge walk route when he helped start it in 1995. "We started off sort of as a takeoff of the other one, we started off as a joke, actually," Thompson said. Now the event attracts several hundred walkers who come for the scenery, the camaraderie and the exercise. Rod and Chris Nettleton, of Lansing, have been spending time in the area for 10 years. Monday they took part in their first bridge walk. "We came last year for the first time and we were too late and we missed it," Rod Nettleton said. This year they learned their lesson and they were lined up 20 minutes early. It's true that walkers have to arrive on time. The event starts at noon and by 20 past the hour most participants are either milling around eating ice cream or hot dogs from the Narrows Delicatessen or heading to their cars. Elmer Kowalske, of Westland, said he started coming to the bridge walk several years ago after he stumbled across it. "We found out about it, well there was a notice in the bar, and we decided to come," Kowalske said. Now a group of friends who all stay at the Vacation Trailer Park in Benzonia make it an annual event. Mary Rogalske, of Jenison, came Monday at Kowalske's urging after 23 years of walking the Mackinac Bridge with her husband. Asked if she was ready for the rigorous hike and the heavy winds that awaited the walkers Monday afternoon, Rogalske said, pointing across the bridge to where her car was parked: "We walked it already." "This is going to be a thrill," added her husband, Fred Rogalske. |
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