We were up early yesterday and didn’t waste any time preparing to leave St. Ignace. I dumped and flushed our holding tanks even though it had only been a few days since I last did that. I wanted the tanks empty because we won’t be hooked up to a sewer line for at least a week. The black tank won’t be an issue, but we have to be careful with our gray water. We’re so used to full hook-ups that we don’t think much about our water use. Though we never run water while brushing our teeth, we do like to luxuriate in long, hot showers. And Donna does a load of laundry most days. But we’re in water conservation mode now.

We pulled out of Lakeside RV Park around 9am and made a stop just two miles later at Jerry’s Pasty Shop. We bought three pasties (pronounced PAST-eez) and some smoked whitefish along with a whitefish sausage. These are staples of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Pasties are a baked pastry that originated in Cornwall – the southernmost county of England. They’re made by placing uncooked meat and vegetables in a circular shortcrust pastry, folding in half, and then crimping the edges to seal the filling inside. Once baked, the result is much like a pot pie with a turnover shape. They were a favorite of Cornish miners who spread the dish around the world. Whitefish is a prime commercial species from the Great Lakes and it’s delicious smoked.

A few miles later, we crossed the Mackinac Bridge and entered the Michigan mitten – if you look at a map of the lower mainland of Michigan, it resembles a mitten. The toll for RVs crossing the bridge is five dollars per axle. With our cargo trailer in tow, we are a three-axle vehicle so it cost us $15 to cross. The last time we crossed this bridge was on our motorcycles back in 2010 when we did a 2,400-mile tour that included the U.P.

Right lane closed – there seems to always be construction work on the bridge

Donna’s view of Lake Michigan to west from from the Mackinac Bridge

Once across the bridge in Mackinaw City, the sky darkened and the windshield became wet with mist. The wipers swept the windshield intermittently and visibility was reduced by the foggy mist. As we drove south on I-75, we hit brief thundershowers with heavy rain at times. There were a few dry patches but it was mostly rain or mist with a gloomy overcast. Around noon, I fired up the generator and Donna put a pasty in the convection oven. We stopped at a Pilot/Flying J travel center near Saginaw. I filled our fuel tank and we parked to eat lunch. The pasty was filled with chicken, potato, carrots and peas. It was tasty and very filling.

Ozark seemed content in her crate. It was our third day in a row on the road and it seems she has accepted travel in her crate. She spent the whole six hours mostly sleeping, often soundly, and didn’t complain.

We took the I-475 loop in Flint and hit I-69 eastbound. I thought it was odd. The interstate numbering system has odd numbers on north-south routes and even numbers on east-west routes. I-69 is east-west from Lansing all the way to Port Huron. From Lansing it turns south to Fort Wayne, Indiana and points beyond, but I think it’s strange to designate the interstate from Lansing to Port Huron I-69.

We were on familiar ground. We found our way to Addison Oaks County Park in Oakland County, Michigan. We lived near here from 2009 until I retired and we hit the road in July 2013. Check-in was easy – we had reserved and prepaid for our week-long stay. Dropping the trailer wasn’t so quick and easy. The narrow gravel road curves past our site. Getting the trailer into position took a few attempts before I got it right.

Our spacious back-in site with the trailer in our parking space.

This was the first time I had to drop the trailer since we were in Texas two months ago.

We were hooked up and settled in quickly with everything done by 4:15pm. A little past 5pm, our friend Nancy picked us up in her van. We drove to Lake Orion where we picked up her husband Tom and headed over to Kruse and Muer Roadhouse in Lake Orion for dinner.

We had a great meal with lots of conversation and laughs for the next couple of hours. Coincidentally, one of Tom’s water ski buddies sat at the table next to us. We recruited him as the photographer for our group photo.

Tom, Nancy, Donna and me

They dropped us off around 8pm and we gave Tom a quick tour of the coach. The coach and trailer are badly in need of a wash after driving all day on wet roads. That’s my chore for today.

Donna’s bicycling buddy, Bill Frahm, is coming over at 11am. They’ll probably take their bikes to Stony Creek Metropark near our old house to ride.