CAMPING - HIgh Cliff State Park in Sherwood, WI

Last weekend we were sitting around on Saturday morning. Can you imagine, WITH NOTHING TO DO?????    So I checked with our good buddies at High Cliff if there were any open campsites, which sometimes happens if there is a cancellation.  Yup... there was one open!  Soooooo in half an hour flat, we tossed in some groceries, some dog food, a few extra clothes (we keep a lot in the rig) and off we went to High Cliff State Park!   (on the NE corner of Lake Winnebago, just east of Appleton, WI.)

As most of you blog readers know, Steve retired from the park in January.  We still like to go back and hang out and visit with the rangers and staff.  This is our first time camping there for this season, and it was like Old Home Week.  The Rangers, the Camp Hosts, and even the Park Superintendent stopped by our campsite to visit.

High Cliff is situated on part of the Niagara Escarpment and it built on the remains of an old Lime Kiln processing facility and mine.  The park is large and narrow, encompassing almost 1,200 acres.

Here is their website: http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/parks/name/highcliff/

Campsites with electric are $28 for WI residents and $33 for non-residents
Campsites without electric are $18 for WI residents and $23 for non-residents.

We are pretty proud of this park, and it's like our home base a lot of the first year we were full-time in our motorhome.  We could stay two weeks and then had to move out for a few weeks to the county park nearby, then move back again.  Steve worked here for 4 and 1/2 years before retiring in January 2017.

We decorated up our campsite, set out our lawn chairs, put up our signs and flags, got the awning put up, hung out our camp lights ---- all settled in for three or four days.

 

Yep, this looks like home to me. Kind of fun to camp with electricity again and run the party lights out on the awning. We do turn them off at night. These draw more wattage than our other set, so we only use them when we have electrical hookups.  The other set are LED and draw much less and we put those up when boondocking.

It was a lazy Saturday afternoon, so I brought out my sewing machine and set it up on the picnic table. I keep this sewing machine in the motorhome closet all of the time, along with enough tools and material, etc. to sew on things when I want.  Less having to pack up when we go on the spur of the moment, like this weekend.  I was working on some little hot pads for a friend of mine, and just putzing and puttering around.

These came out kind of cute. I guess it's supposed to be roses or tulips? It is called paper piecing and then I use two layers of Insulbrite batting in the middle for better protection from the heat when using them on hot handles or baking pans.

The doggies settled in by our chairs and are Good Campground Doggies. I found one of these big carbiener hooks, bought at Home Depot, secures their leash handles right to our lawn chair. Very handy instead of tying them up to things.

They learn to not bark too often at passerbys, but sometimes when they see other dogs they get pretty excited. We try to keep them quiet and shush them and keep them close to us when sitting outside. They are never left outside unattended, and go back inside the motorhome with us. We try to be very good pet owners when camping in public places.

We are enjoying our new oven as well as the four burner cooktop on the stove that we installed aa few weeks ago.  The four burners are nice on top, compared to the two we were limited with before.  The propane oven is a nice alternative. Before we only had the microwave/convection combo. We made lasagna and also used it to brown up some barbecue sauce on ribs that I made in our electric pressure cooker.

On Sunday morning, our friend Vicki came out with her two Shetland Sheepdogs, Tara and Stuart. She enjoys walking out on the trails at High Cliff with the dogs, and we have joined her a number of times to go walking.

At one time, part of the campground had been part of a farm. The old stone walls remain and they make a nice border along a couple of the walking paths. We lined up the dogs and told them to sit and managed to snap this picture with all of them looking in the same direction.

(Left to right: Tara, Stuart, Binney, and Finney)

I made a map of of how far we walked on the trails. It was a pretty hot humid morning but we still managed almost 3 miles. Most of the trails are underneath the shady canopy of beautiful trees so it wasn't too bad.

There is a blossoming romance between Binney and Stuart. Binney on the left and Stuart on the right. Don't worry, both are neutered/spayed so there will never ever be puppies in their lives.

I wore my appropriate accessories for dog walking, which include these wonderful socks given to me by my friend Linda from Tennessee.

After our walk was done, Little Stuart was totally exhausted and fell asleep in Vicky's arms. He is just over a year old and this was a big day for him.  All of the dogs relaxed and drank plenty of water before napping.

Tara was pretty tuckered out as well and curled up at Vicky's feet to snooze for a while while we sat and relaxed under the awning.

Later that evening, the rain clouds moved in, so there was not going to be a campfire that night. We snuggled in our cozy motorhome. Steve watched a good movie while I did some more sewing. The dogs curl up in their little area under the dash. Home sweet home.

He looks pretty relaxed, doesn't he? 

He said it's kind of nice being retired.

Although, the next day the park workers had a problem with the big wide mower. One of the volunteers was using it and suddenly something broke. Steve buzzed on over to the shop and worked on it for a couple hours. He sent someone off for parts and had it back in shipshape and ready to mow again. Once a maintenance man, always a maintenance man!

We rolled back into town on Tuesday afternoon. A shipment had arrived at our home for our next project that I will write about in the next blog.

~~~~~~~~~

Today, Saturday, a wee little munchkin came to spend the weekend with us---along with her two furball doggies. This is Claire, our youngest grandchild.

  

I collect blown glass paperweights. 

The grandtots love to play with them, being glass and all. 

Like a forbidden object they usually can't touch....

but at Grandmuddah's House, they sure can! 

She came along with her two fur balls named Ewok and Biscuit. They have all had a good runaround the back yard and are now begging Steve for some of his breakfast.  "Bacon Bacon Bacon" is what they say....

The dogs are all good around the kiddos, and ours give curious sniffs and then avoidance to not get their fur pulled.  Claire makes a beeline to their doggie tags and hangs on tight and the dogs are trapped! hahaha  The dogs soon learn to jump up on the couch out of her reach.   Smart Doggies!

It is nap time now, so I had a chance to write up this blog. We will have our hands full today and tomorrow with these three visitors in our home.  No projects going on, but I do have one we did during the week to write another blog about.