A Bear in the Woods

H practically begged to go down to his first nap at 8:45a. Why so sleepy? That is perhaps the worst thing about camping with a 13 mo old, the readjustments. H is all about his schedule, for the good and the bad.

On a whim a few weeks ago we decided to look up Sleeping Bear Dunes campsites. I had heard about them through a co worker and since it is on my 27 THings to Do While 27 I thought why not go there? As luck would have it, the campsite we were aiming at had one night available amidst weeks of being booked up. We registered for it on the spot, 15$ campsite. I was happy about it already :)

So we woke up at 4:30 Saturday morning. The car was (very wisely) packed the night before. I only managed to forget both of our toothbrushes. We loaded a sleepy bear into his car seat and took off with coffee in our hands and cautious anticipation in our hearts!

It took us 3 hours and 15 rounds of The Ants Go Marching sung by me in the back seat to get to our first destination. We arrived early at the Platte River and loaded up the little one in the borrowed 25+ year old Gerry baby carrier (the BEST contraption and the winner of What to Bring While Camping with a Baby). We got to see large nesting cages of endangered birds. Discovered that we should have brought waders to ford the river and also maybe should have bought a map. But the river felt delicious on our feet!

Jon flashing some skin to avoid the water.

We lounged on the grass and ate some snacks while planning our next stop. We decided to head to our campground to see if our spot was open and then continue on to the Dunes.

View from the car, just the first of several dunes to Lake Michigan.

Because our site was still occupied we headed north to Glen Arbor (perhaps it was Haven?) for lunch and a stroll around the cute town. Very beachy. We grabbed some slices of pizza and H even convinced me to buy him his first ice cream (superman flavored) which we split. He was techni-colored around the face for the better part of the day.

Me and H decided to race up the dune...not a good idea.

The initial dune was huge yes, but I've done several before so thought nothing of it at first. But those dunes were deceiving us! Each time we crested the sand hills we just saw another looming in front with the false promise that the lake was right after that one. Well no it wasn't.

Jon reacts to seeing yet more hills between him and the water.

22lbs of precious cargo still feels like 22lbs.

H had a lot of fun removing his hat and throwing it to the ground while we climbed. Hilarious. But it really was a great hike. The best part was the descent though :)

The view before descending the big dune.

Another thing I learned was this, carry your camera everywhere if you want pictures. Sadly this is my last picture. This was taken at 6am Sunday morning while Jon was tearing down the tent and I placated a sad baby with crackers and milk.

To streamline the rest of the trip for you:

Things that went well:

H slept- from 10:30 to 5:30 the baby slept in his diaper between us. Little angel. It took him 2 hours of ping-ponging around the tent before he collapsed from exhaustion, cute but tiring even to watch!

We got to see such beautiful things in northern MI that we really want to go back. That along was a success :)

I made and lit a campfire (albeit with 6 matches but who was counting?) that lasted long enough for our hot dog dinner and smores.

We went through Traverse City on the way back- what a fun mix of Ann Arbor, Holland and Chicago. I want to go back!

Things that were less than awesome:

The camp stove was not our friend...a fire hazard for real! No pancake breakfast for us.

It thunder stormed as we woke up (which was actually pleasant) but packing up camp in it with a cranky baby not so ideal.

A loud raccoon got into our campsite and scared me silly. I couldn't see it and only heard piggy-like noises and lumbering about. Yeesh.

So that in a nutshell is what I learned. The best thing was we left tired but wanting to do it again. Success!