Michigan - Day 7, part 1 - Grand Haven beaches and Grand Rapids Public Museum

Woodchip Campground, Byron's Center
Sunday, 7 July 2019

today's route

black squirrel

When we left the campground this morning, Dexter and I noticed another black squirrel running around.  I read online that they're fairly rare, but they sure don't seem so to me because I'm seeing them fairly often.

On the road south
I've noticed on all the roads I've been on in MI that there are warning signs at all the (many) bridges saying they may be icy or may freeze before roadways - typical signs in most states during the winter.  But in Texas, at least, they fold up and can be - and are - made not readable during the warm months.  Michigan's signs are permanent, which has made me understand how long their winters may last.

Grand Haven's only a few miles from Muskegon, and its primary claim to fame may be the "singing sand" on its beaches.  I'd heard about this sand before I left Texas and was eager to check it out.  I hoped that by getting there fairly early in the day, there might be few enough people to let me hear whatever the sand had to say.

Grand Haven

sample of public art in town

The town itself is lovely and seems to be extremely prosperous.  I'm guessing there may be a lot of wealthy retirees here.  It's been a Tree City USA for 25 years (their signs say) and is a Coast Guard City USA.  I don't remember hearing that title before so looked it up, and it's an "honorary designation intended to recognize communities of special importance to the US Coast Guard," per wikipedia.  There's a large Coast Guard station in town, and the town had a big Coast Guard parade on the 4th of July, with their annual 10-day Coast Guard Festival coming up at the end of the month.

Grand Haven sits at the mouth of the Grand River (MI's largest river), where it empties into Lake Michigan; there are boats everywhere, so I'm sure the Coast Guard services have made a big difference to this town and are worth celebrating.

There were dogs everywhere.  Everywhere.  I saw many many more people out walking than I would have expected this time of day - it was about 8:00 on a Sunday - and I think at least half of them had a dog.  And when we got to the beach - more dogs.  Hard to find a chance to walk mine.

The most accessible beach is Grand Haven State Park, which charges an entrance fee for the beach.  Immediately next door, though, with barely a separation, is the Grand Haven City Beach, which is where I went.  Much smaller but the same sand and no entrance fee.  I walked the dogs as far as my nerves would allow, barely avoiding meeting other dogs that were luckily as boisterous as mine (so mine weren't the obvious problem children).  They weren't allowed on the beach at this time of year, so I dumped them in the RV and went to the beach myself.

I'm guessing gull tracks

actually 2 red lighthouses

The sand is very fine, powdery and pleasant to walk on - the kind that doesn't stick very much.  There weren't many people, the only kids were a ways away and the only real noise distraction was the waves on the lake, but I'm afraid I couldn't hear anything I'd call "singing."  I heard it scrunch, the sound I've always heard on Texas beaches, and it was a nice sound - but I'd never have called it singing.  Oh well.  It was still really nice to walk barefoot on a cool white powdery beach early on a sunny morning.

license plate: "FINALLY"

The photo above right of the obvious lighthouse actually shows a second lighthouse, which is the little red house-looking thing farther out on the pier.  Apparently the two signals together were the aid mariners needed to navigate the river mouth.  They were built in 1839 and, of course, have been restored, but apparently have always been red.

Grand Haven has a drawbridge over the Grand River.  After years of living in Seattle, I'm partial to drawbridges, but all I got to do with this one was drive over it.

The drive east
I drove east through Spring Lake, Grand Haven's twin on the other side of the river, and apparently the home of many many churches.

I passed blueberry farms (they say the harvest should start this month, and I do love blueberries), corn fields (though not nearly as many as Indiana), and huge greenhouses with flowers and landscape plants.  I bought some tomatoes in Montague Foods the other day that were labeled Michigan-grown - good tomatoes,

I'm seeing a lot of flat land driving toward Grand Rapids.

I passed a sign advertising Vintage Train Rides, and when I looked them up learned there's a historic train running in this area from April (the Easter Bunny run) until December (the Santa run).  In fact, Michigan has 4 vintage trains - 3 in southern MI and one on the Upper Peninsula.

Grand Rapids's beginnings

Grand Rapids
Actually, I didn't see much of the city because the two museums I wanted to visit were right next to each other and to a main highway and, for once, the directions were easy to follow.  The Grand Rapids Public Museum opened at 10:00 but had only a parking garage, which I knew I wouldn't fit in; the Pres. Gerald Ford Museum opened at noon and had an outdoor lot, but it was blocked off till opening time.  I was there at 9:00 so had my pick of parking meters - free on weekends - on the street across from the public museum.  Even better, we were in the shade for the first couple of hours.

The first thing I noticed were several signs saying, "Beware of Nesting Red-Winged Blackbirds."  I remember a place in Olympia I used to walk my dogs that had those signs up each year, and the dogs and I had close shaves with an angry bird once.  I hoped that wouldn't happen this time.

The next thing I noticed were more dogs.  Lots of dogs.  My parking spot was very near a Holiday Inn that apparently allowed dogs - I saw so many being walked nearby and there was really nothing else open in the area.  But I also saw people walking dogs who may have lived in nearby apartments.  Still, after all the dogs I saw in Grand Haven, and all the dogs I had to deal with at that KOA, I'm starting to think Michigan must be a haven for dogs.

Between the two museums and running alongside the Grand River is a park, which includes a statue honoring the Labor Movement.  Nearby there's a plaque titled "The Great Furniture Strike of 1911," a relatively nonviolent strike that lasted months and eventually achieved some of its goals, though it didn't seem so at the time.

public museum with Apollo capsule

Grand Rapids Public Museum
This is a great place to take kids.  All over the first floor they've got over-sized versions of ordinary toys.  Most people have seen large chess sets - I guess these were about 2' tall.  But they also have dominoes that are maybe 15" long, for instance, and many other outsize toys.  I noticed when I was leaving the museum that they'd been played with in the hour or so since I'd passed through.

Their first exhibit is about cars (this is Michigan, after all), and one item they have is an early RV.

Hayes Crusader Travel Trailer, 1937

info re: RV

I was ready to move in

"yacht-like luxury"

They also have an explanation about what is and isn't a fossil, and use as an example of a not-fossil, the skeleton of the whale behind me.  Which made me look behind me, and I finally found it: suspended from the ceiling.  I'd never noticed it (even though one of Leroy Jethro Gibbs's rules is: always look up).

view from below

view from above

This male Fin Whale was once 75' long and weighed 80-90 tons.  The museum's had it since 1905.  It was such a fast swimmer that few predators could catch it.

Its mouth had rows of baleen, which is fringed with tiny bristles that sift out tiny marine animals from the seawater the whale gulps.  Hard to believe this huge thing could survive on tiny animals, but Nature's specialization is a wondrous thing.

Throughout the museum, they've got small exhibits based on the alphabet (e.g. A is for automobiles, F is for fossils).  C is for carousel, and this carousel is one of the reasons I wanted to visit the museum.

restored to its former glory

its original Wurlitzer band organ

It was made in 1928 in North Tonawanda, NY, by the Spillman Co. and was in constant use until 1982 at an amusement park in Pennsylvania.  The museum bought and restored it, and I wasn't the only one who enjoyed riding it Sunday morning.

D is for dolls, T is for toys (though toys from my generation scarcely exist any more), P is for pewter, Q is for quilts.

Tumbling Blocks, late 1800s

Whirligig pieced quilt, c. 1900

Visitors can see their extensive quilt collection at a video kiosk they have.  On display was an explanation for how to make a quilt, with step-by-step instructions (one is shown in the lower left of the photo on the right).

M is for musical instruments and they have a number of them on display, including how to spot a fake Stradivarius. 

Jamaican rattle

They also had a volunteer of about middle school age who sat nearby with a table that held some unusual musical instruments from other countries and eras that he encouraged passers-by to try out.  Actually, he was so shy he could barely speak, and barely be heard when he did speak.  But once I got him going, he was very informative. 

The rattle in my photo was carved by stones, and I'm sorry that I didn't write down how old it is, but it's old.  It has small stones inside.

They had a beautiful relief map of Michigan. 

Michigan's highest point (1,979') is on the Upper Peninsula, which seems to have a lot of high ground on it, though it's hard to see in this picture because it was too high up for me to get a good photo of it.  I've blown up parts of this map and will attach them to the end of this post if you want more detail.

The UP (Upper Peninsula) is on the Canadian Shield, an ancient and very hard rock formation that also covers most of eastern and central Canada.  The LP (Lower Peninsula) consists of softer sedimentary rocks.  You can almost see the passage of the ancient glaciers over this softer land, gouging troughs that created Lakes Michigan, Huron and Erie with the water from the melting glaciers.

Grand Rapids is marked by a red X in the left-hand map, an area that is behind the table in this photo.  That map shows that I wasn't driving through flat land at all on my way here, except to the extent I was driving through the Grand River valley. 

The Grand River, I learned, was once wide enough to have real islands in it, and is still a trout and salmon stream for much of its length.  This really surprised me, because I'd understood numbers of wild Atlantic salmon were seriously diminishing.  I looked it up and learned MI salmon are chinook and coho, species of Pacific salmon, which left me with another big question of how on earth do they get from the Pacific Ocean to Lake Michigan.  It took a long time to find somebody who'd give me an answer, which is they got stocked here, beginning about 100 years ago, and they never get near the Pacific.  Instead, they live their entire lives in the Great Lakes, mostly in Lake Michigan, before coming in to Michigan rivers to spawn.  You just never know when you're going to learn something about your country.

And here is more info re: why the grand rapids are no longer.

how they looked

why they're gone

W is for watches and clocks, and they've got a doozy of a clock.

It was built in 1888 specifically for Grand Rapids's City Hall, which was (sadly and controversially) knocked down in 1969.  The clock was saved here at the museum.

as seen from below

On the third floor they had a temporary exhibit called Changing America, comparing the situation of blacks in America of 1860 to 1960, and 1863 (Emancipation Proclamation) to 1963 (the March on Washington).

1860

In 1857, Frederick Douglass said, "Power concedes nothing without a demand.  It never did and it never will."

fascinating marchers rules

no one contested these numbers

Thus explaining disputes between labor and management, rich and poor, oppressed and oppressors.  And the tactics behind the 1963 March.  It was called the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, and was strongly supported by labor unions and many working whites as well as blacks.

far l. John Lewis; far r. Roy Wilkins

16th St. Baptist Church/Birmingham

I led such a sheltered life when I was young that so much of these events is news to me.  Not the fact of the March, or the fact of the bombing that killed 4 little girls, or the fact of the sit-ins and other efforts, but what was behind them, what caused them, and what the reactions were.  It's clear I still have a lot to learn about the lives of my fellow Americans.

This post is already so long, and I haven't even gotten to the Pres. Ford Museum, so I'm going to post today in 2 parts.

Here are the close-ups of that relief map of Michigan.

UP

Upper LP

Lower LP

Michigan - Days 5 & 6 - Montague

Muskegon KOA
Friday, 5 and Saturday, 6 July 2019

It worked out pretty well on the 4th to be out of the campground all day, even though we got really hot, and even though I find it irritating that I'm paying good money for a campsite I can't use as I choose.  What I'd really like to be doing is sitting in air conditioning most of the day, and taking the dogs out occasionally for exercise and bathroom breaks.  And that's what I can't do.

As an added irritant, I'm starting to see more ants in the cabin - more with each passing day.  I'm certain the power cord isn't touching the ground, and I don't see ants in the storage cubbyhole for the power cord like I did when I got infected the first time around.  But they're definitely still here, or here again, and I'm afraid I'll have to deal with them somehow.  But we'll spend both days finding somewhere else to light for the day.

On Friday I stopped first in the parking lot of Michigan's Adventure, billed as Michigan's largest amusement park.  Online it looked like there might be shade and some room to walk, and I thought we might be able to stay there a while before people started coming and we'd have to move to somewhere that wasn't open.  Turned out not like that at all.

For one thing, as soon as I turned in I saw signs saying there was a $15 parking fee - $25 for oversize vehicles, so I figured if I got challenged I'd just leave.  But then it also turned out there wasn't any shade, so I didn't want to stay anyway.  But the dogs needed walking so we went out for a bit and were nearly attacked by a Red-winged Blackbird who was clearly part of a nesting pair in the area.  For a few minutes he was hovering right over us and I got a little worried.  But I guess our route took us out of the danger zone, because he backed off and perched on a cattail and kept watching us until we got back in the RV.

Later I looked up that Michigan's Adventure thing and decided you'd have to have a lot of extra money for it to be worth the cost: $36 one day admission if you buy online.  But the parking lot is huge so I guess they pull folks in.

Michigan's Adventure

I spent all day in the parking lot of the Montague High School, having run into some maintenance guys as soon as we pulled in and gotten their permission to stay there.  In fact, they came back to where we were parked to tell me about an area with much better shade than where we were.  Nice guys.  They've got a big campus with a big parking area, so we had plenty of room to walk around.

On Saturday I was so fed up with the ant population that I actually patronized a Walmart, figuring they'd have the ant traps that seemed to work before (the local grocery store has only a fogging spray, which I can't use because we're all living in the RV).  The Walmart did have them, and after we parked for the day, I spent an hour or so figuring out where to put them that I hadn't before and doing a more thorough job of enclosing opened packages of food in the Hefty version of zip-lock bags (the kind with actual zippers).  So far I'd found ants only in the raisins, but I wanted those raisins and hated having to throw them out.  And I definitely didn't want to open up the pet food sometime and find it crawling with critters.  So now we're more ant-proofed and I hope to see a difference quickly.

Saturday I spent all day in the parking lot of White Lake Baptist Church.  See, I spent a fair amount of time online using Google aerial maps to try to find a semi-public parking area that looked like it had trees that might shade us, and this church was one of the possibles.  I'd already checked out several other spots this morning, but either a lot of people were parking there (I'd have thought a church parking lot would be empty on a Saturday, but 2 of them weren't) or there wasn't enough shade or there wasn't enough space for us to walk.  But I can tell you that the Lebanon Lutheran Church is having a Swedish Smorgasbord this Thursday, and a family law/criminal law firm in town - Shon Cook Law - has the nickname The Good Witch of the Law.

Fortunately, the Baptist parking lot worked pretty well.  There were 2 cars in the lot, so I decided to look for an unlocked door to ask permission, and the first one I tried was open, and there was a man doing something with computer graphics in the sanctuary, so I figured he was official enough, and he right away said sure, park anywhere no problem.

Nancy Fleming

When we were walking one time today, I noticed a sign that I guess marked the entrance to Montague, and it said they were the home of Nancy Fleming, Miss America 1961.  I was curious so I looked her up and sure enough, she was born and raised in Montague.

She was an unusual contestant in that her skill was sewing, and her pageant presentation was on dress design.  She remains the only Miss America whose talent was sewing.

She was only 18 and had just graduated from high school so was completely unprepared for what being Miss America involved - she was just looking for college scholarship money when she applied.  She said later that the good part of it all was that she learned not to let fear stop her from trying new things.  Good lesson to learn.

Both days were really hot, just like the 4th was, and we were all feeling the heat by around 1:00.  But I wanted to stay gone from the campground long enough to walk the dogs and have it be late enough for them (the dogs) not to insist on another walk until bedtime, so I turned on the generator to use the fan again.  On Saturday, I checked the weather online and saw it was up to 90° + humidity.  No wonder it feels hot.

Friday I spent the whole day trying to find other campgrounds to move to in the areas where I wanted to see things.  Much harder than I'd expected because they were mostly nearly full, and I didn't want a campsite buried in the middle of the campground.  And I didn't want a seriously Christian campground.  And one of them doesn't accept pets any more.  Like that.  But I've got reservations for Sunday and Monday at one place near Grand Rapids, and at another place for Tuesday in Zeeland.  And we'll go from there.

I stopped at Montague Foods again on the way back to buy more fresh fruit (they had super-sweet cantaloupe and watermelon before) and croissants (which were out of the oven today).  The parking lot was nearly full, so I guess the rest of the town likes that store as much as I do.

Both days I couldn't help but notice how high the level of White River is,  because the access road to a nearby park was seriously underwater, and a gazebo near the marina was several feet deep in water.  It couldn't have been that rain we had the other day because it just didn't include that much water.  Maybe a dam upriver was breached or something?

I passed a business self-explanatorily called Shampoochie.

I've been passing a fruit stand going to and from town, so this time I stopped and they had a lot of fresh-picked corn and pints of fresh strawberries and jars of pickled asparagus.  They usually have fresh asparagus too, but I guess they sold out.  It was a pay-on-the-honor-system, and I'll bet most people do.  I couldn't pass up the corn and strawberries.

When we passed Michigan's Adventure again, I saw the place was packed - clearly a very popular destination.

I leave tomorrow for the Grand Rapids area and hope I don't have to keep leaving campgrounds during the day just to be able to walk my dogs in peace.

This KOA has water slides I've never seen before.  They seem to be inflatable and, as you can see, can be configured to be higher or lower, depending on the age of the kids using them I guess.  I've noticed they're very popular with the kids.

Michigan - Day 4 - Muskegon

Muskegon KOA
Thursday, 4 July 2019

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!

It's set to be a hot one here - well, hot by northern US standards, not by southern standards.  Upper 80s, they say.  And lots of humidity.

I only got 2 hours of sleep last night, I think because people had bright lights on until at least midnight.  I'd been sleeping pretty well at this campground the first 2 nights - almost 8 hours a night, which I was really needing.  I guess I was able to because it was relatively dark, and with all these people here now, that's just not as possible.

While I was lying there resting my eyes, even if not sleeping, I started wondering why I don't remember last year bringing this much trouble with large numbers of campers & their dogs.  That was in New Hampshire, and either tourism is different in New Hampshire or I just got really lucky with the campground I was in.  Now, reading my posts from last year I remember that campground well, and it really was a quiet little place, sort of off the beaten path, even for underpopulated New Hampshire.

If I'd known more about Michigan, I might have been able to find a campground in a less popular area of the state.  Some of the campers at this campground are from out of state, but most of them are from Michigan, based on their license plates.

I spent a little time this morning considering what difference it might make to the dog situation if we moved over one space - those on both sides of me are among the only vacant ones in the campground, so I've got a little maneuvering room.  If I did, one of those campers with 2 dogs would then be directly opposite me, but the other would suddenly be far enough away that we might hope to be able to come and go for walks.  The new campsite isn't as nice as the one I've got, but neither is being a prisoner in our RV because the dogs and I can't leave.

Because of all the dogs in the campground, I knew it was foolish to plan to spend the day in the campground - I'd never be able to walk the dogs, which could be a problem.  I decided to drive into Muskegon and find some place to park for the day.  Online I noticed a hospital near where I'd been yesterday, and I figured the parking lot was likely to be nearly empty on the 4th of July, and the chances were slim I'd be considered a nuisance by security guards, so that's where we went.

The drive into town
I stopped first at a Meijer grocery store.  That's pronounced MY-er, and may be Dutch (large numbers of Dutch immigrants settled in this area), and seems to be a big chain in this general area.  I'd read online that their parking lot was extremely messy, which seemed an odd thing to find in a review of a grocery store, but when we got there, the mess was the first thing I noticed.  Litter everywhere, it seemed.

While I was walking the dogs in their parking lot I came upon a landscaper, who told me (when I asked) that his people have to spend time picking up litter before they can do the yardwork, and it's gotten to be such a problem that he now charges the store $50/hour, instead of a flat rate.  He'd figured that'd be incentive for the store to take care of the problem themselves, which it clearly hadn't.  Nice guy.

The Meijers were - maybe still are - a major force in this area, with new hospital wings and roadways and things named after them.

Muskegon
Driving into the main part of Muskegon, I passed a building labeled Brunswick.  I assumed it meant the bowling people, though it didn't say so, and that is just what it is.  I saw when I looked it up that this building is now a state-of-the-art research & development facility.  I also found this (attached) history of the company that shows a success story of major proportions.  For a company that's been around through the economic fluctuations of the last 100 years, they've proven to be remarkable flexible.   www.company-histories.com/Brunswick

USS Silversides

I passed the Muskegon waterfront, which is extensive and includes a submarine that's been turned into a museum.  The USS Silversides was one of the most successful subs in the Pacific during WWII, with 25 confirmed sinkings.  Today it's a National Historic Landmark and people can take tours if they want.

I saw a sign for access to a car ferry and couldn't figure out what that would be about.  I keep forgetting the south part of Michigan, as well as the north part, is completely a peninsula and nowhere in the state is very far from a Great Lake. 

Muskegon is sitting on Lake Michigan, and it turns out the car ferry was put in service in 2004 as the US's first high speed auto passenger ferry; it runs to Milwaukee at speeds of 40 mph - a 2½ hour trip that avoids Chicago's traffic, aside from everything else.  It's spendy - it'd cost me around $100 to put my RV on, if it could make it on which it can't because there's a maximum height that doesn't allow for my guy.  But cars aren't a lot less.

The day in the hospital parking lot
I was right about the number of cars at the hospital- not more than a dozen in a really big lot.  I had to work, though, to get us a space in the shade.  The whole neighborhood is full of medical offices, some with more shade, but they were much smaller areas and I was a little nervous about moving in for the day.  The hospital worked out fine for most of the day.  I was able to make a start on planning what I wanted to see in Michigan and where I'd be able to camp to do it.

The camping question is hampered, though, by the time of year.  I hope campgrounds are so full right now because people are piggy-backing vacations on the 4th of July holiday, and that the numbers will go down a bit as the month progresses.  Hard to say though.  People I've talked to tell me winters are hard here, and most campgrounds don't open until April, so it may be people are just glad for the chance to be outside.

Here in the hospital's back lot, one time when I walked the dogs we passed a very large crane - even its signage says it's oversized.  And I saw a notice on it saying: "It is prohibited to be within slewing radius while in operation."  I would never have dreamed that "slewing radius" was a term anybody would use, let alone a technical term meant for those who hang around oversized cranes.

It really got warm today, and for the last couple of hours I had the generator on so I could run the fan.  Despite her good brush-out yesterday, Gracie was really feeling the heat.

Back to camp
I passed a billboard on the way back that advertised "Authentic Texas BBQ!" which, of course, I noticed.  It was for a Dickey's BBQ, which apparently has a branch up here in Muskegon now.

And back at the campground where there were even more campers than before.  It looks like a good family campground and everyone seems to be having a good time, with wet towels and bathing suits hanging from almost every campsite.  Just not a good place for us.

Michigan - Day 3 - Montague and Muskegon

Muskegon KOA
Wednesday, 3 July 2019

today's route

While I was still in Indiana, I made an appointment for Gracie and Dexter to get groomed today - baths for both, haircut for Gracie.  I almost didn't call this place because their homepage is on Facebook, which won't let me on because I'm not a Facebook member.  But they were the most convenient to the campground who could take us soon after the 1st, so there we were.

An 8:00 appointment, we were there at 7:30 because I didn't know how long the drive would take, and they took the dogs early so Lily and I were back on the road much sooner than I'd expected.  The grooming place - Magnolia's Grooming - is in the small town of Whitehall, which includes Montague Township within it.  The two towns share lots of things - the 4th of July parade, for instance - but they regard themselves as separate.  They're separated by a bridge across the White River though, to a stranger, it looks like the same town.

My next stop was at Montague Foods, another local grocery store I'd found online, which turned out to be a good little store.  The head baker apologized for not having the croissants out of the oven yet.

Part of the parking lot includes the World's Tallest Weathervane, and I'm willing to believe it is.

info re: this weathervane

World's Tallest Weathervane

I was pleased to see that this isn't just an ornament.  It works.  I had a little trouble getting a good photo of it because it kept swinging around with the changing winds.

history of the vane's schooner

history of weathervanes, generally

The grocery store gave me a 10¢/gallon discount at the nearby gas station, and since the price of gas has gone sky-high in the last few days (probably for the holiday traffic) I decided to use it.  The guy in the station said I'd get an extra 3¢ discount for paying cash, so I paid $2.83 - somewhat higher than just a few days ago.  Anyway, he told me lots of the people in the area right now are folks from Chicago who have summer homes on the Michigan coast of Lake Michigan, which isn't something I'd have ever thought about (Illinois having its own Lake Michigan coast).

Next I headed for Muskogen, not having found evidence of a laundromat in either Whitehall or Montague that looked like I wanted to patronize it.

I made a quick (I thought) detour to the PetsMart in Muskogen to get a new tag for Gracie's collar.  I have no idea where her tag got to, but it's definitely not on her collar.  Turned out the engraving machine there wasn't functioning right, despite the technician having been out to fix it just the previous week, they told me.  So she still has no name tag.  Let's all hope she doesn't get lost before I get to another machine.  And of course it all took longer than I'd expected.

On the way to the laundromat, I passed a business called Lott & Big Weezy's Food for the Soul.  I noticed it as much because Weezy was my sister's nickname as anything else.  But I looked it up and it turns out to be an interesting place.  For one thing, this Weezy is a man named Tawayne.  For another, this is a restaurant that was turned down for financing by conventional lenders (owned by blacks?  one of them an ex-convict?  no thank you, was probably their attitude).  But it looks like a great place and it's too bad I passed before 9:30 - too early for lunch.   muskegontimes.com/with-a-whirlwind-of-fried-fish-chicken-and-waffles

I also passed a business called Diabetic Foot Management Clinic.  I know diabetics can have terrible problems with their limbs, especially when the diabetes is uncontrolled, and people can routinely lose toes, if not much more from it.  Still, to have a clinic that specializes so very narrowly seems odd to me.

The laundromat - Suds of West Michigan - turned out to be spotless and staffed, with efficient and reasonably priced machines.  Life can hold no more.

Back Lily and I went for the dogs.  When I dropped the dogs off, the groomers suggested not clipping Gracie (did you know black dogs can get sunburned? and that the coats of elderly dogs often don't grow back properly?), but instead just combing her really well to get out all the extra hair.  Which is what they did.  They probably got a trash can full of hair off her because she was noticeably thinner.  The dogs haven't been bathed since sometime last year, so I'm sure they'll be more comfortable, and I'm sure I'll enjoy petting them more.

Then back to the campground, where there were clearly many many more people than when we'd left this morning.

The staff told me they had 70 check-ins scheduled for today.  The 2 new batches of folks across from us have 2 dogs apiece.  One batch has yellow labs, and if my dogs so much as put a nose outside the RV those dogs start carrying on like crazy, which of course my dogs respond to, and it's a mess.  And today's just the beginning of the holiday time.

The staff also told me this KOA's having its own fireworks show on Friday night.  I really like fireworks, always have, but this isn't like when we had a house with multiple hiding places for the dogs, and I feel like I should stay with them to reassure them, rather than going outside to see the show.  We'll see.  I'm far enough north that they probably won't start until way after my bedtime.  Rain's forecast for Friday night anyway.

A lot of campgrounds absolutely ban fireworks of any kind; I would get stuck with one that encourages them.  Poor dogs.  Fortunately the AC drowns out a lot of the noise, making it more muted which must surely be a help to them.

Michigan - Day 2

Muskegon KOA
Tuesday, 2 July 2019

We stayed in the campground all day to give me a chance to get my bearings.  Also, it absolutely poured for much of the morning, including lots of thunder.  With so many in this park staying in tents, I sure hope they thought to put up rain tarps.  I've noticed before in campgrounds that some people do it as a regular part of their tent set-up.

The people next to me are tenters and they don't have any extra rain protection, so the stuff left out on their picnic table got completely drenched and, presumably, so did their tent.

When I got us set up yesterday I noticed small ant hills all over this campsite, so I went to serious lengths to keep my hoses off the ground.  I pulled the RV almost to the back of the site to get the water hose connector port far enough away from the site's faucet that the hose is pulled off the ground.  Only by an inch or so but I'm hoping it'll be enough.  And the electric cord I fixed so it's as short as possible and still plugged in, which is keeping it off the ground.  I imagine other campers look at this set-up and think I'm nuts, but I'm still seeing occasional ants in every part of the RV, and the last thing I want is to start up that battle again.

When it rained so hard this morning, I felt like my precautions were justified, because I'm sure the rain drives the ants toward higher ground.  They can still get in via my tires, but at least I'm doing what I can, levitation not being one of my skills.

I spent the day working on my blog from yesterday and beginning to take a look at what Michigan has to offer.  Michigan is the only state with 2 distinct parts, both of them peninsulas.  They both would have borders with Canada, if the St. Lawrence Seaway weren't running through the connecting areas.

The Upper Peninsula has a land border only with Wisconsin, and water borders with Lake Superior and Lake Michigan.

The Lower Peninsula has land borders with Ohio and Indiana, and water borders with Lake Michigan, Lake Huron and Lake Erie.  Michigan's got 4 of the 5 Great Lakes, creating a shoreline that they say is 2nd only to Alaska's.  Although I think Maine says the same thing.  But you get the idea.

Apparently there are enough differences between the peninsulas that a while back there was a moderately serious push by the Upper Peninsula to secede from the Lower and become the 51st state, called Superior.  But in the '50s there was a bridge built connecting the two, and that's gone a long way toward making the them feel more like one state.  And in case you're wondering why they're one state in the first place, there's an interesting little history article at this link.  https://upsupply.co/journal/why-the-upper-peninsula-is-not-part-of-wisconsin

Michigan - Day 1 - getting there & errands

Muskegon KOA
Monday, 1 July 1029

I'd made an appointment to get Lily's nails clipped at the Banfield closest to Muskegon, where I'd made camping reservations, and the appointment was in Lansing for 11:15.  I decided to leave pretty early to allow a margin for error and dog walks, so we dumped the waste tanks and the trash and were gone before 7:00.

Because I needed to cover so much ground today - Lansing is a couple of hours from last night's campground and halfway across Michigan from my next campground - I decided to take interstates the whole way.  That meant taking the toll road (aka I-80/I-90) across Indiana to the eastern corner for the first 1/3 of the trip.

today's route

I had the vents open in the cab and first noticed a skunk had been in the area (always reminds me of driving through central Texas when I was a kid) and next noticed a very strong smell of manure.  Not seeing a stockyard around (and in northern Indiana, you can see for quite a ways away), I concluded that one of the farms we were passing had used manure for fertilizer.  Apparently the farmer owned a lot of land because after several minutes, when the smell only got stronger, I finally closed the vents and turned on the AC.

The last time I was on the toll road, I noticed how rough the road surface was, which seems rude considering we're paying to drive on it.  This time, going in the opposite direction, it still seems rough.  But that's odd because I could tell the road had been recently paved, yet it was still very bumpy.  The seams between the pavement sections were raised, not smooth, and there were breaks in the pavement and potholes besides.  I'm guessing maybe they didn't put down a good pavement bed for the asphalt or something.  But if I were in charge of paying the pavers, I'd tell them to go back and do it again.  A fresh paving job should be smooth driving.

And Welcome to Pure Michigan!  (That's what their sign says.)

Michigan - my 16th state

My first stop was at the welcome center, and it's clear Michigan really likes tourists.  They've got a large, staffed welcome center full of all kinds of brochures and maps and things they want to encourage people to do.  Sadly for me, they weren't going to open until 9:00, and it was before 8:00 when I got there, so I missed access to most of their information.  But there was a well-stocked rack of stuff outside so I was still able to get some basic stuff to be going on with, including a map.  But it all gave me a welcoming impression of Michigan, that they recognize and appreciate the time and money I might want to spend in their state.

Another nice note was the butterfly garden surrounding the welcome center.  Actually, it wasn't labeled as that - it wasn't labeled at all - it was just the landscaping at the rest stop.  But I could tell from the plants they had that butterflies and other pollinators were what they were aiming at.  I thought that was nice.

I passed a billboard that said: Welcome to Michigan - Home of the World Famous Cops and Doughnuts - open 7 days a week.  And it did seem that I'd vaguely heard of this before so I looked it up and learned that about 10 years ago or so, a long-time bakery in Clare City was closing and the 9 police officers at the Clare Police Dept. decided to buy it and run it on their own.  And it's been going strong ever since.  In fact, they've opened 2 or 3 branches in other towns.  You can check them out at this link.   https://copsdoughnuts.com/  I'll check them out myself if I get near any of these locations.

I passed a billboard suggesting I "discover Kalamazoo's checkered past" at the Checkered Cab Museum.  Turns out it's part of the Kalamazoo Valley Museum and is free.  I think I might stop by.

The road surface in Michigan is a relief.  Regular old smooth concrete highway.  Only ordinary bumps.

I passed another sign advertising the Gilmore Car Museum, that includes Duesenbergs among other old brands.  I'd enjoy seeing those old cars but, when I checked on them, I learned they charge $15, even for senior admission, and that's a lot more than I want to pay for old cars.  We'll see.

I'm continuing to pass farms, but the land here is definitely not as flat as in Indiana.  I'm also passing multiple ponds - many more than I saw in Indiana.

I learned online that Michigan has been having an ongoing debate about whether to establish any toll roads, as most of the surrounding states have done.  And so far they've decided that their state is off the beaten path enough that charging a toll might well discourage people from coming to the state.  Even if all folks are doing is passing through, they're still likely to stop for gas or food and spend money here, so why discourage that.  I'm in favor of that reasoning.

I passed an odd situation.  I saw a sign warning me that road work was up ahead; then another sign warning me that the right lane was closed ahead and I should merge left; then another sign telling me the speed limit is reduced for the construction area; then I passed a young man standing on the shoulder wearing an orange vest, holding some kind of warning sign, and paying no attention to the traffic at all because he was engrossed in his phone; then I passed miles of those orange barrels spread out along the shoulder; and then I passed a sign saying end road work, without having ever seen any actual work; and then the highway was back to normal.  But that left me with a big question: what on earth was that guy doing back there holding the sign?  Did they just go off and leave him standing there when the other workers left?  Did he think there was going to be work there and went out to do his job and nobody told him not to?  Huh?

Sure enough, after all that non-road-work, the next section of the road could really have benefited from repaving.   All across Michigan I found sections of non-road-work like this, and a couple of them said they'd be back to working on the road on July 8th.  So I guess they're just giving everybody - including motorists - a break for the 4th of July.

In Michigan, as in the last several states, I've been seeing a lot of cottonwoods.  I tend to think of those as a southern tree because my Aunt Alice had them in her yard in Austin.  But they sure seem to like the northern states as well.

As I was driving along, I noticed that Dexter only had his back half on the seat.  The front half of him was lying on Gracie.  Not the first time he's done this and I can't imagine how it can be comfortable.  But you can see Gracie puts up with it.

I've never taken a picture while I was driving, and I didn't want to take my eyes - or much of my attention - off the traffic, which tends to go pretty fast.  So I just tried to aim and hope for the best.  You see the first one is in focus but lopsided, and the 2nd one is a slightly better aim but fuzzy.  They're both good travelers, which is lucky.  So is Lily, which is even luckier.

I passed an odd sign telling me that at this exit I'd find the State Secondary Complex.  Which meant absolutely nothing to me and I wondered if they meant a secondary school (jr. high and high school) or what, so I looked it up.   It's a 13-building center for police needs: the training academy, testing labs, offices, warehouse, vehicle maintenance facilities - like that.  I can't imagine where that name came from, though.

Their website touts the complex as having achieved a new level of energy efficiency by adding ice-based thermal energy storage to its ordinary systems, a process that allows them to use stored energy during peak-demand times, thus helping out the power grid and saving the taxpayers money.  The website went into some detail about this ice-based thermal energy storage, and I tried really hard to understand what they were talking about, to no avail.  If you're interested, though, they'll be glad to tell you.   http://www.calmac.com/state-of-michigan-secondary-complex

We found the PetsMart surprisingly easily, considering it's in the town of Okemos, which I'd never heard of, on the east side of Lansing.  It took them a while to get the job done because they had some surgeries that took longer than expected.  But Lily got her claws clipped, and I had them give her her monthly dose of Advantage® (which she fights me on doing), and they charged me $17, and it's still worth every penny to me.

We went from there to another little town, Dimondale, which I also hadn't heard of but is just south of Lansing, to go to a grocery store there.  I'm sick and tired of Kroger, whose stores all carry the identical items which aren't always what I want.  And I think ALDI is a racket and object in principle to Walmart, so there isn't much other choice for groceries - hasn't been since Ohio.  I'm gradually learning that there are still smaller groceries around, usually locally owned, usually with an affiliation to Kroger or Safeway but carrying their own ideas of inventory.  And Carl's Super Market was the only one that popped up online for this area, so there we went.

And it's a nice little supermarket.  Including a selection of liquor.  I just find it hard to get used to seeing rum and vodka and bourbon out on grocery store shelves like flour and sugar. 

From there we headed west toward Muskegon.  I should note that, since I made my reservation a couple of weeks ago, I'd been pronouncing it in my head MUSK-eh-gone.  It surprised me to find a decent-sized city that I'd never heard of, since other Michigan cities sound so familiar.  But a day or two ago, I accidentally said to myself muss-KEE-gun, and that sounded very familiar - aha! I've heard of that.  Habits die hard, though, and I still catch myself saying it wrong.  At least I didn't do any of this out loud.

I crossed the Grand River a couple of times and suddenly a light bulb went on over my head - it felt like it literally did - and I thought Grand River - rapids in a river - Grand Rapids - aha! (I'm having a number of aha! moments lately.)  Anyway, I looked it up to see if I was right and, long ago, I was right.  There used to be rapids a mile long, 300 yards wide and 10'-15' high, but when dams started to go in in 1835, the rapids started disappearing.  There haven't been any in 100 years, and that's another special thing lost in the name of progress.

I passed a sign noting something named after Gerald R. Ford and suddenly remembered he was from Michigan.  I'm sure there's a presidential library or something and I'll have to go find it.  I always liked and respected him.

I stopped for gas and, when I was trying to get back on the road, I passed a business called "nothing bundt cakes" - no capitals.  Just as well I hadn't seen it earlier.  When I looked it up I learned it's headquartered in Addison, TX, of all places and has franchises all over the place.  I had no idea.

I passed a camper that had, on the back, the star-outlined shape of the continental US; inside it was this:
   Travel is fatal to
      - bigotry
      - prejudice
      - narrow-mindedness.
   Mark Twain
My kind of people.

I passed an old Pace Arrow (RV brand) about the size of mine, that was towing a car, but not the usual small car - it was a Chevy, bright blue with white top, looked like maybe a '70s era Nova - that kind of Chevy.  But then, these folks who hang onto campers for decades (and this one was at least 20 years old) have vintage tastes.

I learned from a billboard that there's a National Baby Food Festival coming up, reminding me that I'm in Michigan - land of breakfast food and Gerber.  I looked it up and it is indeed set for July 17-20 in Fremont, where Gerber baby foods started.  The line-up for the festival is entirely child- and family-oriented: a Hula Hoop contest, bubblegum blowing contest, water balloon toss, frog jumping, turtle race, beanbag toss, kids parade, rides, a flea market and Christian music, ending with an early Sunday morning worship service.  Too wholesome for words.

I happened to notice a car stopped on the left shoulder on the other side of the divided highway and a police car pulling up behind it with flashing lights - and from then on for many miles the traffic over there was backed up.  It was around 4:00, folks were probably going home, and by the time they made it through the congestion there was probably nothing there to tell them why they'd had to deal with it.

All the waterways we passed were very full, and the Muskegon River (north and south branches) were no exception.  The water level was halfway up the reeds or whatever that green stuff was growing on the banks.  It reminded me a little of swamps I've seen in Florida or along the northern coast of the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico where I've seen wild flamingos.

I passed a sign for the World Famous Flea Roast and Ox Market, which was unfortunately held last week.

And into the campground, which is one of the least developed KOAs I've seen, and also one of the smallest.  Looks like they cater as much to tenters as to RVers, which is unusual, and they've got a lot of cabins, all sitting on a tiny lake that doesn't seem to have a name as far as I can tell.  (Per the KOA map it's called "Private KOA Lake.)  But we're here for the next 6 days, thanks to the 4th of July holiday, and I'm sure it'll be fine.  Lots of trees.

My month in Indiana

My take on Indiana

where I went this month

The people
Almost everyone I met was friendly and pleasant and helpful.  I was interested to note that in southern Indiana, many people spoke with very strong southern accents, which reminded me how close it is to Kentucky.

Everyone told me they liked living here, and many told me they loved it.  But even of those who are happy here, some said they'd rather live somewhere that's not so flat and has a connection to the ocean.  Which is about the way I came to feel about it.

Hoosiers (a term they prefer, likely because it's easier to say than Indianans) are proud of their state and its history, and the younger ones are amazed that folks outside the state know so little about it.

They certainly have some big cities - well, they really just have the one, Indianapolis, plus others that are definitely decent-sized, like Ft. Wayne and South Bend.  But my impression is that most of these folks are farmers, or are farmers at heart - self-reliant, community-oriented, sturdy.  So they don't present the big exuberant image that a more urban state might produce.  They seem quiet, though friendly.  That sort of person.  Very nice people.

The land & Life here
I can tell I'm moving farther towards the Plains states by the land.  Maybe it's the contrast with West Virginia, which was only 2 months ago, but I can tell Indiana is flatter than Ohio, which seemed pretty flat to me.  Though, like Ohio, Indiana worked itself up to some really pretty hills in the southern part, and that area, closer to the Ohio River, seems much greener and more attractive.

I'm told this is fertile land, and it's certainly being cultivated.  I don't know the percentage of Indiana's land that's devoted to agriculture, but it looked to me like at least 65% and likely more.  Yeah they've got towns and industries and scenic beauties and waterways.  But the overwhelming impression I get from Indiana is farming.

I don't think I've mentioned a word this month about Indiana's caves, but I should have because they've got quite a few.  One of them, the Wyandotte, I really wanted to visit but just didn't have time for.  The Wyandotte is one of North America's largest caves and contains what's likely the largest underground mountain in the US.

Indiana seems to have a lot of water, though I think most of it is rivers; their lakes mostly seem pretty small.  I think they don't have dams on most of their rivers, so they don't have the reservoirs that other states have.  On the other hand, they've got beautiful, full-flowing rivers all over the state.  I'm actually surprised I haven't seen many businesses that cater to rafting or kayaking - I guess either these rivers aren't conducive to those activities or Hoosiers just aren't that interested in tourism.

They do have some beautiful state parks, though, and these are heavily used by Indiana residents.  But now that I think of it, I don't think Indiana is really focused on tourism.  Most towns and counties have glossy brochures at welcome centers that encourage folks to come to this museum or that shopping area.  But I haven't seen the massive numbers of hotels in these towns that you'd expect if there were high tourist traffic and there aren't as many campgrounds here as I've seen in other states.

I'm back to thinking that most of these folks are really more focused on their communities and on the farming lives so many seem to lead, than on drawing in people who are passing through.

Driving here
Drivers here are a mixed bag - they're perfectly happy to exceed the speed limit by 10 mph or more, just like in the urban states, but they're also very polite and generous.  They can be counted on to move to another lane to let in merging traffic, and they do it as soon as they see you, even if you're a ways ahead, so you don't have to wonder if they will.

I think I only heard one horn blowing this whole month, and that was when somebody kept sitting at a green light (probably texting) without moving ahead.  Actually, I don't remember seeing anybody at all talking on phones or texting, though I'm sure they were.

Indiana isn't the greatest on posting signs that actually help motorists new to the area, but it's certainly not the worst.  I got lost often, partly due to missing or inadequate signage.  And I ran into a lot of detours, many of which were water-related - flooded roads or bridge repairs.  I guess that's the result of Indiana having so many waterways.  But their highway exits are well-marked, which is definitely not the case everywhere.

The road surface on their main roads is almost as bad as Ohio.  But on their state and county roads, which is mostly what they've got, the road surface is as good as anywhere else.  Having mostly just 2-lane state and county roads is probably a result of it being such a farming state. 

Indiana, the Crossroads of America, claims 13 interstates running through the state.  The fact is, though, they mostly run east-west and mostly either through Indianapolis or along the northern border.  The main north-south road is a US highway, not an interstate, though it seems like it could have been since it runs from Kentucky to Michigan.  I guess the states just didn't bother to coordinate to get the funding for it.

What I didn't see that I wanted to see
I really made an effort to be more organized here so as not to miss as much as I've done in other states, and it paid off.  There was still much I missed, but you can see from the map above that I managed to cover the state more thoroughly than I've been doing elsewhere.

But I missed Evansville entirely, which I hadn't intended to do, including an African-American Museum there that they're proud of.  And I could have been there for their Juneteenth celebration, which I'm sorry to have missed.

I wanted to see the campuses of colleges I've heard of for years: Ball State University in Muncie (a town I also wanted to visit), Purdue in West Lafayette (another town I wanted to visit), Notre Dame in South Bend.

I'd have liked to visit Dr. Ted's Musical Marvels in Dale, the steam-driven train in Connorsville, the Thor RV factory in Elkhart, and the Studebaker Museum in South Bend.  There's also that chocolate factory that offers tours in South Bend.  And there's the Wyandotte Cave with its underground mountain that I hadn't intended to miss.

Finally, I missed tasting a signature Hoosier delicacy: the breaded pork sandwich.  Apparently the best places that serve this pound the pork tenderloin until it's the size of a dinner plate and bread it and fry it and put it on a bun with lettuce and tomatoes.  I guess when you know that this dish and the sugar cream pie (Hoosier pie) are the culinary specialties of the state, you've got the flavor of this place.  (Just a little pun.) 

Conclusion
I liked Indiana a lot.  It feels comfortable, undemanding, easy-going.  The people seem pleasant, the towns are attractive, the way of life is laid back, though hard-working.  From the point of view of whether I could live here, though, I think it's a real shame it's so flat and so far from the ocean.  I just couldn't do it, after spending half my life in the mountains by the ocean and loving it.  But I do like Indiana.