Monday, July 16, 2012

Yes Virginia There is a Santa Claus

Christmas, MI - July 13 to 16, 2012 Our Current Location

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We have another monster trip behind us today.  We racked up a whole 31 miles before we settled in the town of Christmas, MI at the Chippewa Indian Kewadin Casino.  This is another Casino that gives you funny money for staying in their RV parking area and they give you electricity for free.

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The reason for not going any further is that this area has a number waterfalls we want to see and there's more exploring to do along the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

When we pulled into the parking lot at the casino, we chose spot number one because it looked like it would be the least likely place to have another big RV pull in next to us.  As we were testing the connection and hooking up the power cord we saw a security guard making a beeline for us.  I thought he was just being real friendly, but he had other things on his mind. As he was sitting in his nice air conditioned office watching us, his security camera suddenly went on the blink.  So he figured he'd just mosey on out and see just what us criminal types were up to.  When using a power pedestal, we always turn off all the breakers we're not using.  Apparently we turned off one that his camera was using. Oops!

Afterwards we went to the service desk of the casino to announce our arrival and see what we needed to do.  The guy at the desk asked if we were hooked up to the electric power and we said "Yes".  He responded with "Well then you're done".  Dry humor these Yoopers have, eh! We asked about signing up for a casino card, so he got us registered and low and behold he added $10 credit on Frank’s card and $15 credit on EJ’s card. Turns out it is ladies night and they get and extra $5.

Since there was still plenty of daylight left, we drove over towards Pictured Rocks in Munising, MI and checked out Miners Castle overlook.  This spot gives the viewer a teaser view of the colors and formations where the rocks meet the lake. It was neat to see the view from the top of the area we had seen from water level yesterday.

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On the way back we stopped and hiked to Miners Waterfall. Along the way we discovered these pesky little flies called Stable Flies. They look like an ordinary house flies except they have vampire teeth.  It so happens they are also sexist as they were only attacking me, not EJ. This was a nice hike that had a nice level part and then lots & lots of stairs. Going down wasn’t nearly as challenging and coming back up.

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On the way back to Big Guy we made one more pass through Munising to see if there was anything we missed. Didn't look like it and besides, we had funny money burning holes in our pocket that the casino was just waiting to take back. Kewadin, here we come.

The big adventure on Saturday was to drive to the far side of the park, a distance of about 45 miles. But first we needed to fuel up for the day by eating breakfast at the DogPatch. That's right Daisy Mae and Lil' Abner were watching over us and served some of biggest, fluffiest pancakes we’ve ever had.

We opted not to take Big Guy this way, even though it's in the direction we're generally heading, as the campgrounds have no power and the road looks like it was designed by a drunken engineer. We stopped at a few more spots to let the Stable Flies have their way with me and to see a 12 mile long sand beach(that EJ couldn’t resist), the Au Sable lighthouse, the old Coast Guard station whose water access became beach(you can still see the rails covered with sand) and a log slide dune.

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The log slide was used by loggers to slide cut logs into Lake Superior where they were towed away to sawmills. It's a surprising sight to see sand dunes rising out of the water to a height of 100 feet. I'm guessing those logs picked up a lot of speed going down the chute in the dunes to the lake surface.

There were a couple more hikes  EJ wanted to tackle, but I was tired of being fly bait and declined. Then at Sable Falls, close to the end of our eastward journey for the day, she remembered she had some bug spray in the Element. I tried some of that and darned if it didn't work.  The little buggers finally left me alone. I could once again enjoy being outdoors.

At the Grand Sable Visitor Center I remarked to the Ranger about the saneness of the person who designed the road through the park. She informed me that it was designed that way on purpose in order to mimic a "wandering river". The main compliment I can give the road was that they didn't waste any pavement on straight lines.

Our eastward journey came to an end in Grand Marais, a former logging community, now a tourist destination.  It's a very small town with a nice Township Campground, several bars and two restaurants that we could find.  We're finding out that homes and restaurants up here don't have air conditioning.  So whenever it gets to 80 degrees or above outside , it starts to get a bit uncomfortable inside.  Either they're tougher than we are or it didn't used to get this hot.

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On the way back we had two more falls to check out and a few more roads to explore along the lakeshore.

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Sunday & Monday were an "off" days as we had chores to catch up on(like catching up on our blog updates) in preparation for our final drive across the remainder of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.  Our next stop will be Sault Ste. Marie where we'll cross into Canada. This last stretch of the U.P. of Michigan is pretty isolated, no towns, and according to the locals, has the longest straight road in the U.P.

Once we cross the border we'll lose our phone service and our hot spot internet access. One good thing though, no more annoying political calls or texts for the next two months.

Driving Directions from 32 Fox Valley Dr, Orange Park, Florida 32073 to Munising, Michigan _ MapQuest

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