CAMPING VACATION - Day 6 - East Fork to Dubay Co Park Wisconsin

Oh my, this weather is really warming up fast! Although it got down to 40 degrees last night... Today it was due to get up in the mid-80s. We decided to hit the road and go another 70 miles further east. There is a nice little Portage County Park called Dubay Campground. It's on a little Bay of the Wisconsin River in a big Flowage area. Steve had camped here before with his dad and brother on a fishing trip, so he knew the park.

We decided that electrical hookups would be wise with the temperatures going up. We would probably be needing air conditioning by the mid afternoon so we hit the road by 10 a.m. 

We pulled down to the parking lot to hook up the Tracker.  We each do four jobs in our hookup process:

Interruptions can be a very costly or dangerous mistake to make while hooking up a toad.

As a couple, we doublecheck each other's "jobs" when toading our Tracker....  Here is our checklist:

Steve has 4 things to do while hooking up:

1. attach the arms of the towbar
2. attach the power cord plug
3. attach the safety cables
4. put on the padlocks on the pins

and I have 4 things to do inside the Tracker when hooking up

1. shift Tracker into 2nd gear (or neutral)
2. shift transaxle into neutral
3. turn key to "on"
4. tie a white rag to top center of steering wheel while checking that it is freely moving-- so we can see the white rag in our rear view camera.  Then with a glance in the camera, we know the tires are tracking correctly and not cocked sideways after turning a corner. 

-- then he goes inside and runs the motorhome signal lights through "left turn, right turn, tail, brake"  while I stand behind  the rig with the hand held CB telling him each one is okay

---- and then he pulls forward while I walk alongside for a short distance.  I am watching to the be sure all tires are rolling and the two little flip levers on the tow bars flip up.

Then, and finally then, he lets me inside... where I lock the door and make sure the steps are up on the motorhome as we take off on another adventure! 

Ready to roll....

As we were hooking up the Tracker at East Fork, I was able to sneak a few pics of the prisoner inmates finishing up the leaf raking over in the picnic area and the boat landing.  I was discreet in snapping them, just to show the piles of leaves they were working on. The campground looks really nice from their efforts!

The first part of the journey was about 5-6 miles of gravel road, but it was nice and newly graded. From there we worked our way up to highway 10 and then across to almost Stevens Point.

We did manage to make a little stop at a quilt shop in the small town of Neillsville, WI. Fortunately we found three long parking spaces in a row right across the street from the quilt shop. Easy to pull in with the motorhome and tracker towed behind.

https://www.facebook.com/christiecountryquilts/

Steve waited in the rig while I popped into the shop. I was looking for a certain fabric,

and the owner was helpful in suggesting where I might find it. 

The owner was very pleasant and she showed me an upcoming project for a class --- including this cute camping pattern!!!

I didn't stay long because Steve and the dogs were waiting in the rig.  I said my goodbyes and told her I would post this information on my blog and also on my Facebook Quilting groups.


Just before the entrance to the campground, I saw four more deer who needed a lecture on why they should hide in the woods and stay away from the road.  They didn't want to listen until I whistled loudly like calling a dog.  Then they took off.

We pulled into the campground and there were only two other campers here. There was a host camper but nobody around. So we grabbed a self registration tag and picked out the site we wanted.

http://www.co.portage.wi.us/department/parks/collins-park/dubay-park

We took site number 33 down on the end it was peaceful and quiet. With all the tall trees around we would get plenty of shade but have a wonderful gorgeous view straight out the front windshield

What a view! 

We managed to hit the lawn chairs with some lunch and relaxing 

after getting all set up on the site.

This vacation stuff is kinda hard, ya know? 

With 50 amp service we can easily run both of the roof air conditioners and anything else we want. By 2 p.m. we took a little nap as it was warming up, and by 3 p.m. we were ready to close up the rig and turn on the air. Whoooiiiieeee. It got much hotter as the day went on. By 5 p.m. it was the highest temperature, 84. Go figure?  Especially when overnight last night it was 40 degrees?

After supper, I did take out some sewing... I am starting a new quilt. I needed to iron some partial blocks during the construction phase. It was nicer to have the hot iron outside... Instead of inside the motorhome.

 This one is going to be pretty....

I think I am going to name it:

"WHAT I DID ON MY SUMMER VACATION"  

Also, I finished up the two little coasters for each side of our bed in the motorhome.

They match the quilt and the window headers.... 

The weatherman did promise that things will cool down by evening. And he is right. For once. It is now almost 9 p.m. and the temperatures are dropping. We are sitting outside comfortable and cozy in our lawn chairs listening to the crickets, the frogs, and an occasional bat is flickering by, chasing the mosquitoes. Yes, there are few mosquitoes out here--- the first ones we have seen all week. We took out a Thermacell unit and fired it up. We are sitting here in comfort with no mosquitoes at all around us. But we know they're out there because the bats are after them

What is nice about using the thermacell unit is that you're not putting anything on to your skin or in your hair or sprayed on your clothing. It's great to use around the grandchildren as long as you set it up high enough that nobody touches it. No poison lotion sprayed or junk on children's skin, nor little babies putting their hands in their mouths full of deet. I think it's one of the best inventions ever for camping!

I'm thinking it's time to head in now and insert the photos into this blog. I have to use the laptop for that part of the blog process, so I can resize the photos.

These two are totally bushed... and zonked out between our lawn chairs as I was writing that part of the blog.  I think they are tuckered out?

I don't know what happened lately with blogger but it seems that my blog has fallen off a lot of people's reading lists. I have not changed my blog address so I have no idea why it's doing this. I have had a number of people write to me saying they had no idea I have been posting a Blog for the last 3 months because I am missing off their list. So, if you want to follow me, please add this blog address back to your blog reading list.

https://kareninthewoods-kareninthewoods.blogspot.com

Thanks!!