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SLEEPING BEAR DUNES NATIONAL LAKESHORE - PT 2 (MI)

THURSDAY - Today's 18-mile move down the road was a breeze, all the way up until we were backing into the campsite.

The Ranger at the check-in station had no problem letting us check-in 1-hour early and we were quickly on our way to the campsite.

Our campsite was plenty long enough and wide enough for an easy fit. The problem was the angle between the roadway and the campsite, then throw in a stop sign and a campsite post in the worse possible locations for where the truck needed to be in order to straighten out once the trailer was headed in the right direction and it turned into a very difficult maneuver.

After four failed attempts at getting into the site I threw in the towel and pulled completely off the site, went around the block and came in at an unconventional angle and nailed it on the first try.

We've backed THE POD into over 500 different campsites in the last 6+ years, so you'd like to think we could do this blindfolded by now. That was part of the problem today, we didn't take into account that each campsite is different and each one needs to be approached according to it's unique surroundings. Lesson learned! I hope.

FRIDAY - The "#1 Thing To Do" down here in the southern end of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is to go tubing on the Platte River.

There are two different places that the outfitter will drop you and your rented tube on the river. The shorter of the two trips down the river will take no more than 1 hour to float and the second location is a 2-2½ hour float. Both trips end just before the Platt River meets Lake Michigan.

Riverside Canoes also rents kayaks, rafts, paddleboards and of course canoes that you can take down the river, all the way from the outfitters location to the river's end at Lake Michigan. These trips usually take 1½-2 hours, depending entirely on how much you want to paddle.

We of course elected to do the longer tube float trip and planned to be on the river by 2PM.

TUBING ON THE PLATTE RIVER

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Here's what the Riverside Canoes dock looked like an hour before they opened.
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Not a single person on the river at 7:30AM.
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After the morning chaos here's what it looked like at 1:30PM when we arrived.
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The shuttle drops you and your tubes off about ¼-mile walk from the river's edge.
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Finally in the water and well out ahead of our pack.
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An hour into our float and we're still going strong.
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We're even within sight of the group who launched before us now.
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Here's what we found on the beach at the end of our trip, it looked like more chaos!

MONDAY - After a rainy weekend, Tricia was itching to get back out on the river, this time in a kayak.

I didn't share the desire to see the river again, so I elected to forgo another trip down the river and instead went into town to fill ROVER's gas tank and eat a second breakfast at Wendy's.

I dropped Trica at the outfitters at 9:00AM where the longer kayak trips launch from and made plans to pick her up at the end of trip at 11:00AM, then headed into town.

KAYAKING ON THE PLATTE RIVER

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Here's Tricia in her "Happy Place", out in a kayak on the water.
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Being on the water early on a Monday morning meant she had the place all to herself.
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It also gave her time to pull over and stop to take photos, lucky us!
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Half way down the river is the fish weir where we put in with the tubes on Friday.
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The turtles didn't seem to mind how close that duck was to them.
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This Great Blue Heron was on the hunt for breakfast...
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...and a few seconds later it was time to eat!
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With fewer humans on the river the wildlife was out and about.
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Hey, there is another paddler out on the river this morning.
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I recognize those sand dunes, it means the trip is almost over.
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Tricia went twice as far, in half the time, as we took in the tubes.

TUESDAY - It's that time again! Time to go "Knee Deep in the Great Lakes", this time in Lake Michigan.

This is #3 of 5, which if my math is correct, means there's only two more to collect to have the complete set.

Here I am knee deep, at least I was when a wave went by!

Here I am with Sleeping Bear Dunes in the background.

With the moderate easterly winds today, the waves were more like a seashore than a lakeshore.

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