VACATION – didn’t get too far?

(Due to no air card signal here, I have to post three days worth from a saved file using Live Writer and publish it when I can as we travel)

 

Ahhhh Friday afternoon, all set, the rig is packed, the plants are watered, the mail is on hold, our kids and neighbors are handling the house duties---- we should be READY to roll…  

but ….

Poor Steveio comes home from work at about 3pm to say these dreaded words: 
“I’M NOT FEELING TOO GOOD”   

Oh boy… so he took some Claritin D and went to lay down.   Little Chelsea was picked up by her daddy and I took the dogs outside to the rig in the driveway to keep them outta Steve’s hair so he could get some rest. I figured we wouldn’t leave now till Saturday or Sunday when he felt better.  The dogs and I hung out in the motorhome for the next three hours, with the air conditioning running, while Steve slept in peace in the house in the lowest level guest room where it was cooler. 

At 6pm the door of the motorhome opens and he bounces in and says he has the house all closed up, let’s GO!   LOL

We hooked up the toad, and off we went!  (double checking each other’s set-up steps and all went well)

We headed out to the west, into the blinding blazing sun as it was setting… we got as far at Gillett and he said we COULD turn north instead and to call my sister in Michigan and see if they are camping.  He said maybe I would want to spend the first few days of our vacation with my sister…awww how sweet is that?

Sure nuff, they WERE camping at Lake Ottawa and would save us a site.  We knew we would be arriving after dark, but knowing the park as well as we do, plus the huge backup spotlights in each side of our rig, we will be fine arriving late.

On the way, we stopped in Lakewood to fill with diesel, $2.85 a gallon, so that was about a $200.00 trip cost so far.  They always are cheaper than any surrounding towns, so we were lucky to fuel up there.

Got to Lake Ottawa by 9:30 pm.  Our favorite site #17 was taken, but #11 close to my sister and broinlaw Fuzz was saved for us.  We backed in without a problem and got out the chairs and some beverages and joined them at their campfire.  Ahhhhh VACATION!

 

Saturday we woke up to sunshine, blue skies and wonderful woods full of birds and red squirrels.  Since sis and hubby were still sleeping, we took the dogs for a nice lap around the campground in the early morning quiet. It felt soooooooooo good to be out in the woods.

We knew our propane was getting low, and instead of taking a chance while on the road to parts unknown, we decided to hop back in the rig after breakfast and drive to town to fill up at Marlowe’s Propane in Iron River.  They are always reasonable and know how to fill a tank on a motorhome and give us the household price, not the higher BBQ grill/20 pounder recreational price.   Since we hadn’t really set anything up the night before, not even the jacks, we were fine to hop in a go, leaving the Tracker, table cloth and a sign on our campsite saying “CAMPSITE OCCUPIED – BE RIGHT BACK”  to prevent anyone from thinking it would be available for the upcoming night.  First come first served here.  We dropped off our Saturday night fee in the Iron Ranged tube and headed out for propane.  Filled that up, 38 gallons at $2.50 per gallon.  and filled our little 20 pounder we take for outdoor stuff at $16.

Came back, got into our site again and level and we were all happy campers.   The guys decided they wanted to work on Fuzz’s boat and trailer, tracking down a short somewhere.  They had bought a new battery and wanted to go over all the wiring before installing it.  Plus they had new taillights for the trailer to be installed too.

We women hopped in the Geo Tracker and did some rummage sale-ing.  Found a few little things, on being a Swiffer Carpet Flick that is used to quickly skim over the carpets and not have to use any electricity.  Good for the these leaf-butt dogs who drag in dried leaves on their furry butts and shed them off all over IN the motorhome! 

A lovely supper of steaks, tater packets, shrooms and cucumber salad and grilled zuchinni over the fire…

 

Just sitting around BSing till the supper was done….  sun setting and lovely weather….

 

But then the guys went out in that boat and fished till 11 pm.  We women sat around the fire and kept the lights on so they could find us along the shoreline in the dark.  The boat is parked near their campsite overnight along the shore instead of loading it back on the boat trailer in the dark at the boat ramp.

We toddled off to bed about midnight, after hearing all their wild fishing tales of glory and success.  Of which we saw NO fish come back with them.  They said they let them all go?

 

On Sunday we woke again to sunshine, 67 degrees, not a cloud in sight.  Sipping coffee here and catching up this blog post, and soft music playing. ahhhhhh  this is nice.

Once Schmoo and Fuzz were out and about, we went over to start breakfast.  Fuzz started bacon in the big fry pan.  This looks like a regular 9 inch cast iron pan, but no, it’s really a big fry pan about 20 inches across.  Once that was done, Fuzz laid the flat griddle over the rack and Steveio took over.   He was making us panny-cakes!  

Whew!  It’s HOT standing over that fire to ladle on the batter

Yummmmm what a TREAT!

 

Once breakfast was done and cleaned up, the guys went and loaded the boat… we packed up and got “road worthy”, said our goodbyes, dumped and rinsed at the station and headed out.

On the way out, a state cop flew past us headed towards the park… then a sheriff whizzed passed us too, headed out there.  Light a flashin, so something must have been going on.  Will wait for my sister to get home later this afternoon and tell me what was going on.

 

We headed west on U.S. across the rest of the U.P. and as I write this, we are passing through Ironwood, home of downhill skiing at Powderhorn Mountain.  We found a little harbor and campground on the shore of Lake Superior that we will head to… if we don’t care for it, we will continue on to Copper Falls, WI as it’s something we had seen on the PBS Show “Discover Wisconsin” last winter and made a note of wanting to see that too.

 

Will see what will happen, but for now I will post this…..