Vicki, Steve and Lexie took off Monday afternoon to Ohio’s East Harbor State Park for a mid-week camping adventure. The park was only 90 minutes away and traffic was light. Steve was hoping to bring the bikes along, but the hitch receiver is from China and we don’t know when we will get it. We were happy to again tow the Mini(Cooper) from the Winni(bago)
We did most of the packing on Monday morning, on a wet Monday morning. The weather was partly cloudy during the drive (no blinding sun in my eyes as we drove west.)
The East Harbor state park campgrounds are close to Lakeside, the community we visited last year with Josh, Juliana, Calvin, Myles, Dave and Becky Merk and Andy and Rachel Merk. And the Oak Harbor cooling towers were visible in the distance at nearby Catawba State Park. [V Sidenote: Oak Harbor was the scene of our first blended family weekend getaway – Sheltons and Galeckis and everyone made that trip. And Steven never lived it down that we stayed in a house in the shadow of one of those nuclear power plant cooling towers but right on Lake Erie.] The East Harbor state park also has the distinction of having the most camping sites (535) of the Ohio state parks. Fortunately, we got one of the full hook-up sites. There were a lot of campers there on Monday, with lots of children biking (electric biking? really?) and running around. The number of campers decreased on Tuesday and Wednesday and then picked up again on Thursday.
Our site (C20) was relatively wide with large trees providing shade. We had great conversations with one of our neighbors: Fred and Sue. Fred even sang with us one evening when Vicki brought out the guitar at the campfire.
This is a happy camper!
On Tuesday, Vicki and Steve played nine holes of golf at a nearby city course (Mill Creek in Sandusky.) Vicki had a great putting game, and Steve’s drives, with his new-to-him driver, were satisfyingly long.
The three of us explored the state park, looking at the glacial grooves the the park’s history. Steve and Lexi explored something every morning, walking for two to three miles. They found huge bugs (mayflies?) near the water that were very aggressive.
We also visited sites in the area, getting a total of three state park stamps for our Ohio state park book. East Harbor’s beach was busy when we got there at 3pm. There weren’t many refreshments near the beach, but we made do with the shaved ice.
Marblehead lighthouse and the peninsula it was on was very interesting. Steve had to go up to the top to feel the wind in his hair… and he had a great view of Vicki and Lexi from the top looking down (they are the little black spots next to the blue canopy.)
Catawba Island state park was just a parking lot, playground and boat ramp. And the stamp was back at East Harbor…
We also tried some local food: Crabby Joe’s Restaurant and Bar with the monster rum runner drinks. And some local ice cream (that even Lexi got to enjoy).
Friday, June 13: time to leave East Harbor and travel east to the Winery at Spring Hill (east of Madison, OH.) This was our first adventure in boondocking. The Winery at Spring Hill has sites for campers but doesn’t offer a dump station or electricity. They did provide us with water, but only because we asked. Two other campers showed up, both from Geauga County. And both were trailers. We talked with them a little before we went into the winery for dinner, wine and dancing. Our friend/dance instructor/pet sitter Pete was playing with his band, 3 for All. Pete came to the RV before the show to say ‘hello’ to Lexi. And our friends Pat and Dave Deschler drove from Concord to have dinner with us and also see the RV.
The boondocking experience was interesting, the biggest challenge was that the batteries in the RV would not have lasted through the night supporting Vicki’s CPAP machine. We ran the generator so we could watch some TV (another episode of the Chosen) but the generator is noisy and not conducive to sleep. So we slept without the generator running (and Vicki slept well without the CPAP machine.) Saturday morning was wet from rain. There wasn’t much to clean up outside so we got onto the road quickly.
V.-We’re getting better at packing up before and unpacking after these trips. We only needed one season of clothing this time and some rain gear – unlike the winter trip that took us from 20 Degrees F to temps in the 80’s and then back to cold again. Having the TOAD- the towable and detachable Mini Cooper- gave us a lot of flexibility and we could do more sightseeing. Lexie is getting used to the smaller cabin in the Mini Cooper, we’ve figured out the best way to get her in and out of it. She refused to jump in from the tailgate. We’re looking at a one day, one night local trip next week. The longer trips will come in July.
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