Hoffmaster State Park Camping Trip 6/10-16/12

OK, so it's been a month since our camping trip. I guess I haven't been too motivated to record it since it wasn't the most exciting camping trip ever, or the most illuminating or instructive. Didn't take a lot of pics. However what it was was...relaxing. Very restorative. Which is after all the whole point of a vacation. Sometimes it's OK to not get things done. Sometimes.

Standout memories:

---The duck confit nachos at Brewery Vivant, a place in Grand Rapids we'd never visited (we visited the very familiar Founders on the way back home the following Saturday). It's in a converted funeral chapel. These are out of control. Fatten-up-for-nuclear-winter food. Duck confit in bechamel sauce liberally ladeled over thick tortilla chips. A sprinkle of diced tomato and scallion just as a whimsical, colorful garnish. Not the kind of thing you think of eating when it's 90 degrees outside, but when else are we going to be able to try these?

---Site 232 at Hoffmaster State Park. Best site in the park in our opinion, and we got lucky enough to reserve it online in January. Just based on the park map, we chose a site with plenty of space and privacy. Bonus: close to the bathroom building. Extra bonus: no one used the site next to us ALL week. Really weird, because the place filled up for the weekend.

---When I can finish a book, that means I've had gobs of downtime for reading. I finished 'World Without End' by Ken Follett. I really enjoy his books. This one is the sequel to 'Pillars of the Earth'. Since then I've gone back to re-reading 'Pillars'. Sentimental bonus: dad's name is written in his engineer's blocky handwriting on the inside of the cover. I wish I could ask him what it was about medieval England he loved so much. This is an entertaining story about cathedral construction and political/religious intrigue. Whatever it is, I like stories from that time period, too.

---Suddenly noticing the usual aches and pains are just plain gone by about day 3. And my eyes function better. This only happens a few times a year when I've been away from work for more than a weekend and have actually accumulated enough sleep.

---Revisiting places Tim and I loved to go 20-some years ago when we were dating/spending weekends together. From his apartment on the west side of Lansing, Lake Michigan shoreline towns were an easy drive away. Saugatuck, Holland, Grand Haven and Muskegon were all  visited during the course of the week.

---We logged 13 miles of hiking/walking in one day (other days 10 or 11 miles). A lot of that through sand, and up/down dunes.  And it didn't feel like work until the end of the day when my legs finally felt a little achy. Had a childish meltdown in the shower that night when the water refused to get any warmer than chilly...all I wanted was a hot shower! Yet, oddly, there seemed to be hot water in the toilets in the same bath building. WTF??!

Odd Side Ales in Grand Haven, which is in the same old building as a restaurant once called the Piano Factory. We were the last customers served New Years' Eve 1991 before it closed and became another restaurant. But Odd Side has only been there a year or two, and sadly I can't remember what all we enjoyed there while talking to the bartender, but we did fill a growler with the Koffee Stout to drink at the campsite. And got all excited about the Mayan Mocha Stout to be released later.

---The hummingbirds that found the feeder we hung from the camper awning in less than a day. They have to be making the rounds of feeders put out by residents, because how else do they find us so fast and show so little fear of us? Most memorable was the very vocal female who hovered a foot from my face while I was working on mixing up a dutch oven rhubarb upside down cake. She announced her presence with piercing chittering every time she visited.


---Visiting another brewery (new for me, not Tim): New Holland. We enjoyed the Cellarman's Platter with our beer (I tried the Dragon's Milk...quite delicious). An assortment of olives, cheese, bread, crackers, beer cheese spread, and the most ridiculously deliciously intense, oily tomatoes ever. Somewhere between sundried and fresh. The waitress was utterly useless when I asked her about them. I want more of them.