Camping in Michigan

Things I learned while camping with our mother in Michigan:

1) If you tell the guy at the border that you're going to visit your mother, they'll pretty much just wave you through.

2) A firing range in the same state park where you're camping makes for a rattling first few hours. (Michiganders sure love their guns!)

3) Mothers will always try to feed you.

4) My mother has bought the Mother Of All RVs.

The drive down was un-eventful, we stopped for Road Coffee (aka Tim Horton's) and timbits, purchased from the slowest, but most persuasive coffee jockey I've ever encountered. I order our coffees and am finished talking before she even punches the first button. So I go back.

"Two... medium... co...fees..."

"Ok"

"One with milk"

"Medium... coffees"

"One with milk... and... one... sugar..."

"Ok"

"One with double cream..."

"One with milk..."

Oh god.

We finally get through the coffees, and I bravely forge ahead and order a ten-pack of timbits.

"What kind do you want?"

"Oh, whatever. Just assorted, but no triple berry ones."

The world stops.

"You don't like the triple berry?"

"Um. I don't know. I just don't like things with goo in them."

"Goo?"

"Yeah, aren't they filled with jelly or something?"

"I don't know. Goo? Blerp blerp triple berry defense mechanisms ON!"

I have no idea how it happened, but she dissected a triple berry timbit to show me that they did not contain "goo". Now I'm feeling guilty for a) holding up the line with my goo-phobia and b) for her wasting a timbit to assuage my fears.

"Ok, I'll take two of the triple berry timbits as well".

I really didn't want them, but at this point, if I didn't take them I was afraid it would break her heart. She seemed so horrified that perhaps I didn't like their precious triple berry timbits, and I offended her when I mistakenly called a honey glazed timbit just a "regular glazed". I could not win.

We peeled out of the Stepford Tim Horton's and didn't look back.

We pulled up to the campsite at about twelve thirty - my mom had parked her little electric scooter out front of her RV with a flourescent lantern so that we could find her spot. We hadn't seen my mom for over a year, so it took a while to notice that there was an RV behind her in the dark. But when we took it in... we knew... it was the Mother Of All RVs.

The A/C was blowing cold enough to store meat. The entertainment system included what appeared to be a 27" TV and VCR and DVD player. While in the living room area, you can relax on either of the two front seats, or the couch. Or the swivel rocking chair.

Take a few steps to the kitchen/dining room, and you're on a hardwood floor. There is an oven a stovetop AND a microwave. A large fridge and freezer, and a pull out pantry...

The bedroom has a full sized queen bed, which you can walk around. And a desk. And there's a dressing area just outside the bathroom - which has a nice big shower with a skylight.

It is the Mother Of All RVs. I can see the appeal. Later in the weekend, we compare computers, and mom shows us her GPS system. She will never get lost. This robot navigator will keep her on track, and suggest good times to gas up. We spend some time trying to figure out how Rachael and I can track her movements from home, but we never come up with the solution. Seems silly. You'd think that there'd be a way for other people to follow your movements using your GPS signal.

She's planning on driving it out west to see Mt. Rushmore and the Grand Canyon. She's always wanted to, and she's finally doing it. I'm really thrilled for her.

We take the dogs on the 1/2 mile meadow walk, and stop to smell the wildflowers. We're up to our necks in flora and fauna. Or maybe just flora. Or just fauna. I dunno, I'm no botanist. All I do know is that we saw some flowers, some beetles, some garter snake holes and some butterflies (ick).

Yes. I don't like butterflies. They're creepy cousins of moths, of which I am slightly phobic. Something my family cheerfully points out in front of others, anytime a moth comes into view. I won't run shrieking from moths, but I really don't like them near me. When we arrived at camp, the first thing to follow me into the RV towards the light was a flappy, fluttery moth. My mom was quick to point out that we needed to get it out, and she and my grandmother went to town trying to evict the bugger. I felt really brave. Grandma sent me out to the fire while she took care of it. Yup. She's 77 and she's protecting me from a moth. I'm so proud. I tell her not to kill it, and scurry out to the fire like a coward.

What can I say? I was scarred as a kid by a mental, divebombing moth "attacking" me in the dead of night at our cottage one black summer night. I shivered, tearfully hiding from the moth under my covers, and cheered for the rest of the summer anytime the bats swooped up to our big picture window eating the moths flapping agains the glass. Hooray bats.

I'd probably feel differently if it had been a bat in my room, that scary night.

Our big event while camping was a trip into "town" to get Dairy Queen. My mom treated us all to ice cream, and we ate it in the park while watching people fish. There was a sign warning swimmers that there are no lifeguards, a strong current, and "underwater objects". We tried to figure out what those underwater objects might be. I told them that when we were in Amsterdam, the locals had told us that every year when they dredge the canal, they pull up all kinds of crap, including hundreds of bicycles. Everyone rides bikes in Amsterdam, and I guess almost as many people steal them. Or just throw them in the canal for kicks. It is agreed that it is a "weird" thing to do.

We see a garbage bin in the distance that appears to be overflowing with driftwood, and both my mom and grandmother sheepishly admit that they want to go look and see if there's any "good driftwood". Ok.

We finish our ice cream, and walk to the garbage bin. I get close to it first, and burst out laughing.

What had appeared to be driftwood was in fact two mud covered bicycles. My mom takes a photo to memorialize the coincidence.

On the drive home, I lecture my sister again on the importance of her role as The Navigator. I had explained the seriousness of her job on the way down. As The Navigator, you have to know what's going to happen two steps from now, but only tell the driver what is next. If there's a turn coming up, you need to tell me whether it's going to be right or left, the name of the road, and approximately how far. We got the routine down pat after I made it clear that she should not assume that I have a CLUE how to get where I'm going.
We happen across a surprise Cracker Barrel on the way home, and I introduce my sister to the joys therein. I order an extra meal to go, a surprise "Thank You" gift for the ex-boyfriend for house and dog-sitting for the weekend. I declare it at the border, which does not necessarily impress the guard. I don't care, he's not going to catch me in his duty-pimping ways.