High Cliff State Park, Wisconsin

Our last road trip of the summer took us a few hours north of Kenosha.  We were ready for our annual BBZ Family camping trip.  We are the first B (Burleson).  Our wonderful family friends the Bakala's are the second B, and the Z is for our friends the Zingleman's.  We've now had this annual trip for six summers.  When we all started, we were in tents and our kids were much smaller.  Now, the other two families have moved up to pop up campers.  We camped for the first time, with these friends, in our teardrop.  Our kids camped in the small tent that my friend and I took to Iceland and lived in for nearly three weeks.

The campgrounds were large and very nice.  We joined everyone there on a Saturday.  Our first night was incredibly different than the second.  The first night, the campground was packed with young families and lots of kids.  The second night was nearly silent; save for us.

We went on a couple of very nice hikes and explored what was called the Niagra Escarpment.  It was essentially a large rock face that dropped off about one hundred feet.  Beyond the rock face was this large lake, Winnebago.  The view above was from the forty foot observation tower that we climbed on our hike.  

Our friends liked our teardrop, but weren't sure they would be able to sleep in it.  I was again pleasantly surprised at how well we slept in it.  The cool breeze coming in through my side window helps me sleep more soundly than at homes it seemed.  The only problem was that sometimes the sound of the fan drowns out any outside sounds.  I was on the side that looked out at the kid's tent and I could at least see them clearly through my window.  It helps that they were less than ten feet away!  

The Carpe Diem at the entrance to the High Cliff State Park.

Just a few notes on the performance of the teardrop.  The bed area was perfect.  Again, the Fantastic Vent pulled cool air into the cabin through the windows.  When Erica closed hers, I got even more and loved it!  We are still having some trouble with my side's door latch.  There seems to be something wrong with the alignment of the lock and the slam plate.  There are a few other small problems.  The hatch started having trouble unlatching.  I'm not sure if I accidentally moved the latch on the bumper when I trimmed up the metal or if there is something wrong with the actual handle.  I'm going to have to put Jack in the cooler tray again and have him help me diagnose the problem.  Both of these issues need to be remedied before the next trip.  

We are hoping that we will get at least one more family trip in before it gets too cold out.  I'm shooting for Kettle Moraine's northern unit.  The topography there is really unique and would be fun to see in the fall.  I would really like to see how the teardrop does in the late fall.  I'm hoping I can get one of my kids to come with me!

First Father/Son Trip

Just returned from my first road trip with my son.  We ventured to Starved Rock State Park in Utica, IL. 

We were lucky.  The campground is set up so that one half of it, the wooded area, is able to be reserved.  This is nice if you are coming from far away and want to ensure that you have a place to stay for several days.  The other part of the campground is non-reservable and is first come/first served.  Luckily, we found the very last site in the wooded area and were able to lock it in for one night.  We quickly set up our camp and enjoyed some lunch.

Jack airing out his feet after our hike.

After munching, we decided to head to the visitor's center and orient ourselves.  We had heard about the canyons here and were excited to see them.  Jack was anxious to see a canyon and maybe a waterfall for the first time that he remembered.

 This is the first canyon we hiked.  It is called French Canyon.  

French Canyon had lots of water in it, but none coming down the falls area.  We found a little pool at the bottom of the falls that had some fairly large, young fish in it.  Not sure how they've survived or how they will as the summer lingers.  There was a nice person at the canyon who took our photo for us.

Jack scrambled up into one of the many caves in St. Louis Canyon.

This is St. Louis Canyon.  It is the only one in the park that still has water coming down from it at this point in the summer.

We had a good day yesterday.  We relaxed and I learned how to play the card game called:  Magic The Gathering.  My son is really into it and he was very excited to share it with me.  It's a lot like what I remember of Dungeon's and Dragons.  I wasn't a big player, but I got the concept.  He and his buddies are huge players in it.  It was fun to be able to share that with him.

We wished we had brought our shelter with us at about 7 a.m. this morning.  We heard a thunderstorm roll into the park.  It sounded worse than it really was due to the trees and all the leaves that held and dropped the rain.  It was enough that everything we had left out was quite wet, but that's when we were very happy to have been in the teardrop.  We were warm and dry inside.  

However, everything was slippery and wet in the park, so we opted to head home and unpack.  It was a short trip, but a really nice one.