Moving day

Wednesday was moving day. I only had water and electric hookups in Munising, so the first stop was the campground dump station. I’m still learning about managing the tanks (i.e. how much I can shower, do dishes, etc.), but I was happy that I could make it the four days in Munising and none of my holding tanks were more than 3/4ths full. I didn’t even do much to conserve water usage, other than Navy showers, so there is still room for improvement if necessary.

Pictured Rocks National Seashore

Yesterday I hiked part of the Pictured Rocks National Seashore, doing a 10.5 mile loop that allowed me to see Chapel Falls, Chapel Rock, Chapel Beach, Grand Portal Point, and took me right along the Pictured Rocks for about four miles. Seeing the Pictured Rocks up close was amazing, most of the pictures don’t do justice to how high up I was on the cliffs and how close the trail went to the edge. This was too far of a hike for me at this point though, I was gassed the last two miles and really wished I had broken up all the sights into two days instead. The road in and out of the trailhead was pretty interesting, the last few miles were mostly dirt with some pot holes and ruts that were a solid foot deep.

Moving day

Saturday was moving day again. I was really happy when I pulled in to the state park on Wednesday and there was hardly anybody around, especially since the campsite was a little tight to get into and I had to use part of the site across the road to back in. Well, come Friday afternoon the campground filled up, and when I was leaving on Saturday (probably the only person to leave), I had a nice audience. Things went pretty smoothly, although I did notice a few miles down the road the storage door on my camper was flapping a bit. It was several miles before there was a safe space to pull over on the small, two lane road I was on, so I was pretty nervous about losing my stuff. Fortunately I don’t think anything bounced out. I had locked the door but I guess didn’t slam it shut hard enough. Hopefully won’t make that mistake again.

Moving day

Wednesday was a moving day. Check-out at Mackinaw Mill Creek Campground was 11 AM, and check-in at Tahquamenon Falls State Park wasn’t until 3 PM. Since it was a relatively short 83 mile drive that took just under two hours (and I didn’t have to stop for gas!), I decided I would just see if I could check-in a couple hours early since it was the middle of the week in off-peak season. Unfortunately I wasn’t allowed (which was kinda ridiculous because there were only about two other campers in this 30-40 site loop), but they at least had a parking lot right by the entrance where I could park to wait until check-in. If I’d known then what I know now, I would have went down to the Lower Falls, since there is RV parking down there as well, but a nap was a pretty good second option.

Mackinac Island

I was off to a slow start this morning, one too many snoozes so I missed the 9 am ferry (I don’t want to hear it, I’m on vacation I shouldn’t have to set an alarm) to the island by about two minutes. The next ferry was at 10:15 am, but I waited until the 11:15 am for an extended ride that went under the Mackinac Bridge too:

Mackinaw Mills Campground

I didn’t have much planned for my stay here in Mackinaw City, other than I knew at least one day was going to be spent on Mackinac Island. My campground offers discounted tickets for the ferry ride over, but the camp store that sells them still has somewhat limited hours since it is not peak season yet, so they were closed before I was able to check-in yesterday, and didn’t open until 1 PM today. So I spent a pretty lazy morning around the campground, waiting for the store to open. First, troubleshooting an issue I’ve been having with my Starlink internet setup (thought I was going to get a break from that kind of crap while not working), and then walking around exploring. I also popped my drone up for a bit, it really is amazing how large this campground is. I was more than a quarter mile off shore and almost 400 feet up, and it still took two pictures to get all of the lakefront of the campground photographed:

Departure

After a lot of planning, a lot of being anxious, and a little bit of being nervous, the time had finally come for me to leave! I hooked up and took this picture of the last time I’ll see my house for almost six months:

I have been a bit nervous about driving around with the trailer by myself, it hardly makes sense that pretty much anybody is allowed to get a trailer and drive around with 50 plus feet of combined vehicle without any training. So far so good though, and in some ways I think it is easier than driving on a normal road trip. When towing my trailer, I know I’m going to be slow, so it’s easy to just get in the right lane, set my cruise control, and in some ways it seems more relaxing. It reminds me of what I’ve heard being a pilot can be like: a period of intense concentration while getting to an interstate (i.e. taking off), followed by semi-long periods without much to do while cruising, followed by another period of intense concentration while getting off the interstate and to my next stop (i.e. landing).

AJ Jolly

I have wanted to get out and do a shakedown night or weekend this spring to try out my trailer and make sure everything works as expected, but due to weather, a fairly minor medical procedure that resulted in having to get stitches (twice), and other prior commitments, it hasn’t happened. Until today that is. Not really ideal to do it two days before I leave on my actual trip, but better late than never I guess? Anyways, I got a campsite at a local campground, AJ Jolly, and came out to do a test night.

Kicking things off

So…I finally did it. Well, at least there has been enough set in motion that “it” has sufficiently started. It all started last year in March, before I even realized it, when I ordered a new Ford F-150. This was the first domino that fell, and allowed the rest of the chain reaction to start. It took a long time before my truck was ready for me due to all the supply chain issues during Covid-19, so I didn’t actually take delivery of my truck until the middle of August. A quick road trip to Granger, Iowa, and I was driving back home in this beauty the next day: It was shortly after I had a truck that an idea was born: a long road trip across the country. Or more accurately, this wasn’t really a new idea for me, but the possibility of it becoming a reality was much closer than it ever had been.