Day 3: Indian Lake State Park MI to Peninsula State Park WI: Spring Waters and Salted Fish

Getting an early start to the day, we were the first to arrive at Palms Book State Park to visit the Great Spring. This 200 ft hand operated wooden raft was incredible. It allowed us to travel across the crystal clear waters of the Kitch-iti-kipi spring. We could see clearly to the bottom to see the spring waters bubbling up and the huge fish swimming past. Being the first to arrive in the park, we had the raft - and the views - all to ourselves for the first trip of the day. It was truly fantastic.

Back on the road, we passed from the Upper Peninsula, MI into WI. Our first stop here? Cheese!

We drove to Green Bay where we visited the city run theme park - Bay Beach Amusement Park to ride Elvis’ favourite roller coaster the Zippin Pippin. Even  Alistair rode the coaster! We also rode the swings and the Ferris wheel. It was a great afternoon. Ali’s hat flew off during the swing ride and had to be rescued by Daddy.

Our evening was spent in Fish Creek attending a traditional fish boil. We feasted on boiled potatoes and white fish, creamy coleslaw and cherry pie with ice cream. We are stuffed!

Our home base for the next three days is Welcker’s Point in Peninsula State Park WI. Heading back to the camper, whom today was christened “Sally T.”, we witnessed a blood red sunset due to all the forest fire smoke from up North. It was eerie and beautiful, all at the same time.

Day 2: Chutes Provincial Park ON to Indian Lake State Park MI: Shipwrecks and Sunsets

We crossed the border today into Michigan. We spent the morning on Lake Superior at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum where we learned all about the disappearance of the Edmund Fitzgerald. We also read about the many other shipwrecks - there are over 6,000 in the Great Lakes - with the largest culprits being bad weather, weak steel structures, and surprisingly but very significantly, collisions with other ships in foggy weather.

We had a local delicacy - pasties - for supper. These are meat, potato, and turnip filled pastries that are eaten with ketchup. Nothing wrong with that yum!

We did some souvenir shopping. Alistair chose a raccoon tail. He is one cool dude.

And sightseeing. Paul Bunyan (a mythical lumberjack that has in recent years been commandeered for commercial purposes, according to Wikipedia anyways) and the Manistique lighthouse were both favourites.

While the rest of the family headed for showers and bedtime, I stayed up to experience the sunset over Indian Lake. Vacations with incredible sunsets are the best!

Can’t believe Day 2 is over already. This trip is flying by!

Day 1: Ottawa ON to Chutes Provincial Park ON: Blueberries and Mushrooms

Day 1 of our adventure was spent putting some distance between us and home. First stop was Mattawa to visit the statue of Big Joe Muffraw. Did you know he paddled all the way from Ottawa in just one day?!

We waved to the Super Stack as we passed through Sudbury on our way to blueberry picking. We didn’t have much luck with foraging for blueberries (we did find a few and some wild raspberries) but luckily we found a lady selling wild blueberries along the road later on in the day. We stocked up for blueberries oatmeal for tomorrow’s breakfast.

Our sleeping spot tonight is Chutes Provincial Park. We stretched our legs after supper with a 5km hike in the park. It was wonderful to move after a long car ride and we discovered both fancy waterfalls and a rainbow of mushrooms in the forest.

Tonight we’ll have a campfire and maybe even some s’mores!