7/27/07 (Friday): Another crazy week! Our laptop died. We think it's just the monitor because it sounds like it's loading up properly. I'm hopeful that my computer wiz, Mark, will be able to hook it up to a monitor and retrieve some of my files/software so I can load it on the new computer. Until I get the software for the digital camera, I can't post pictures, but bear with me and I'll keep posting without pics for now.

We've made settlement on our house--yay! It's kind of sad to give up our home that we treasured for so many years, but we believe it was the right decision for us. We plan to keep enough money to buy or rent another place when (if) we give up this roaming lifestyle. We both love Florida and want to be fairly close to our family and friends, but Orlando has gotten so busy that we probably wouldn't have wanted to go back to that house anyhow. We hope that our buyers will have as happy a life there as we did. It turns out that their previous address was right around the corner from us! We figure that maybe they were renting and wanted to stay in the neighborhood.

I forgot to mention that the day before the computer died and we made settlement, we had a bird day. By that I mean that we were at Lake Michigan and Wiley was fishing while I sat on a bench and crocheted. I was talking on the phone to the title agency about our upcoming settlement, when Wiley started hollering for me to come help him, he'd caught a seagull! I think the title agent thought I was crazy!! We managed to release the poor bird (the hook was in his beak), but he then got tangled in the fishing line when he tried to fly away. We released him a second time and he flew off, apparently none the worse for wear.

As if that wasn't enough birdly contact, we got back to camp to discover that a camper had found a carrier pigeon (it had two bands on its legs) that had crashed into the window of the camp office. We carried it into the camper and put it into a laundry basket, gave it food and water and covered the basket with a towel. The poor thing ate, drank and went promptly to sleep. The next morning, we contacted the bird's owners and returned the bird to them. They said that several birds had escaped a few days previously. They were really happy to have the bird back!

We continue to have a good time here. The weather has been beautiful--although we could use some rain. There are still lots of places we want to visit. I've settled into the routine of the store and feel pretty confident with most of the tasks. Wiley is constantly getting compliments from the boss about the speed and quality of his work. I think we'll be getting a pretty good reference from these folks. We're also enjoying socializing with the other workampers. We have two new workampers, and have already spent an evening with them. The insurance company has had investigators out here looking into the fire damage and they're gradually getting all cleaned up from that. Everything in the store had to be discarded because of smoke damage, but we have new merchandise lined up and waiting in the barn for when the store has been cleaned. The campers are being very understanding about sharing the one remaining restroom. We've got our awning back and really enjoy sitting outside in the evenings.

That's it for now--sorry I don't have pics for you. I have some on the camera that I'll share when I get my software back.

7/21/07 (Saturday): No pics today--just a quick blog to update everyone about what's up in our neck of the woods.

We traveled to Ypsilanti Tuesday afternoon right after work for a visit with Tom and his family. My granddaughter, Claire, had surgery the week before, and Kristin had asked for my help with the older girls so that she and Tom could go to Claire's post-op visit. Claire is healing nicely and there will probably be no future complications, other than (possibly) some work on the scar as she grows. We're really thankful for that! I took Anna and Margo to their gymnastics class on Wednesday, and that was a treat. They really seemed to enjoy the class. Thursday was Anna's swimming class, and I spent some time playing in the pool with them after the lesson. Great fun! We'll probably visit again next month.

We came back to a very upsetting situation here. There was a fire in the men's room that pretty much destroyed it. The investigators have been here for two days now, and arson is suspected. This, on the heels of the burglary, has the owners very upset. Most of the campers have been wonderful about it, taking turns using the remaining ladies' room and porta potties. Hopefully the campground's insurance will cover most of the losses, and maybe they'll even come out of it better than whole, because new rest rooms were in the planning stages anyhow. Thankfully no one was hurt. The owner's live upstairs, and their home was heavily smoke damaged and their little dog had to go to the vet. But the owners have an RV they can stay in until the mess gets cleaned up. I just hope the owner doesn't decide to close for the rest of the season, which would leave us looking for another position late in the season. Oh well, what will be will be, and we'll figure something out. Maybe we'll take something in California and finish out the season there!

I went out and bought the new Harry Potter book this morning at Walmart. I don't have to go to work until 5 PM today, so I have a cup of tea and some pleasant hours ahead of me! I'll post again as soon as I upload the pictures from my camera. Peace!

7/13/07 (Friday): Happy Friday the 13th! It was a good day here in the campground. Very busy--all sites are full up.

We have had lots of little adventures since the last time I blogged, so I'll get right to it.

We hiked part of a rail trail in Whitehall/Montague, about 10 miles north of here. The wildflowers are glorious--these are sweet peas in white, pale pink, bright pink and purple. That's the White River in the background.

Wiley did a little fishing in the White River from the rail trail bridge. He didn't catch anything, but he sure had fun trying! I sat on a bench in the shade and read for a while.










Next we drove northeast to the little town of Fremont. It's small, but very picturesque. We walked around and explored a little.
















The buildings downtown were very Victorian.













The bank has been continuously in business since 1902!


















We found this little restaurant around lunchtime. Imagine our surprise when the Dutch Bakery had an Indonesian menu! My good friend, John, is from Indonesia, and his wife Julie (who comments on this blog often) lived and worked in Indonesia for many years. So, of course, I had to try Sate, which was chicken on skewers in a spicy peanut sauce. Delicious! Wiley had chicken croquettes. He then proceeded to sop up all my leftover sauce with the French bread that came with our meal.

From Fremont, we continued in a big southeast loop, and stopped at this cute little orchard to pick some cherries. We only picked a pound. I've been snacking on them all week.





















On our next day off, we went to Hoffmaster Beach State park (I don't think that's spelled correctly). I walked a long way up the beach and Wiley did some metal detecting. It was a gorgeous day!









There were stairs up to the top of a dune that was about 775 feet high! The view was spectacular, but my poor legs felt like spaghetti when we got back down!
















Our final stop in the park was the visitor center, which was one of the nicest I've ever been to. There were all kinds of exhibits explaining how dunes are formed, what kind of wildlife is adapted to live in the dune environment, and some history of the area. There was also this big window overlooking a pond. The birds and squirrels were enjoying their baths. (The dark looking flying bird is a decal on the window to prevent birds from flying into the window.)




Finally, to end this blog, here are some random shots taken around the campground in the past week or so. This cute little "cabin" is actually an RV with a porch that folded up flat against the side. It was tiny, but very unique.









The sunrise this morning was lovely. It was quite cool overnight (50's), and the mist rising from our lake looked like it was on fire. I couldn't get back early enough for my camera to catch that, but this shot of the mist is still pretty peaceful, don't you think?








I almost forgot to show you these pics. Rather than try to re-format the entire blog, I'll just add them here at the end. This is billed as the world's biggest weathervane. It's in Montague.










We saw this deer one afternoon after work when we'd gone to the breakwater so Wiley could fish. She walked right up to us! She was eating the day lilies near the White River Lighthouse.















Okay--that's it for another day. Stay tuned (and send me those comments, please--they keep me going!)

7/9/07 (Monday): I'm back! The WiFi has been up and down, but I think he's got all the bugs worked out now. I'm so glad to be back online! I've got lots to blog about, so I'll get right to it.

We went exploring on one afternoon after work. Just north of us is the little town of Whitehall (it's where Tom and his family stayed when they came to visit over the 4th). It has a lovely lake with a bike path all around it. This train station has been turned into a trail head for the bike path. We took a leisurely stroll around town and part of the way around the lake.










This wood duck family was enjoying the warm day. It sort of looks like they're swimming in the sky, doesn't it?!





There are still lots of beautiful wildflowers in bloom here. Right now we're seeing cornflowers (at least I think that's what these blue flowers are called). We also have Queen Anne's Lace, black eyed Susans, daisies and sweet peas.

Tom, Kristin and the girls all came on Saturday. We had a great time. The first afternoon, we just hung out around the campground.











We had a campfire and the girls enjoyed their first s'mores. For the unindoctrinated, a s'more is a sandwich of graham crackers, hershey bars and roasted marshmallows--ooey gooey and delicious!









The next day we went to Summer Fest in downtown Muskegon. It runs for a whole month, with performances by big-name bands, art and craft shows, street performers and fireworks. We had a blast!















On their last day, we went to our favorite spot near the Lake Muskegon Canal, where it dumps into Lake Michigan. We had a nice walk beside the canal and the girls played on one of the several playgrounds in the area. We thoroughly enjoyed their visit.








The 4th was exciting in more ways than one! The campground had lots of activities all day--face painting, races and fireworks. But that night, around 3 AM, we were awakened by a huge crash. We tried to get out the door to see what was happening, but we couldn't get the door open. It was raining cats and dogs. Finally Wiley was able to get the door open wide enough for me to squeeze through. Our awning was just destroyed! Fortunately, the insurance will cover it, and we'll just be out our $50 deductible.

The next night, the camp store was robbed. I forgot to mention that the campground's router went down, and we only had one working computer in the store. So we had been working at a disadvantage even before the robbery. We'd also lost one of our Workamper couples unexpectedly, so we were short handed. But we all pulled together (we worked our days off), and got through it okay.

To end on a happier note, we're still enjoying working and living here. The people are great--we've visited just about every evening with them. There's lots to do in the area, too. Wiley has been enjoying picking blueberries and blackberries in the woods near our lake. I've made blueberry pancakes several times, and tonight I made blackberry dumplings. A couple of our Workamper friends came over and enjoyed them with us. They were quite good!

I'll blog again soon. Today we went to Fremont and had another adventure!

7/5/07 (Thursday): Wow--what a crazy week and a half! The campground's WiFi has been down, so I had no internet access. It was also down in the office/store where I spend most of my working hours. That was really the pits on a holiday weekend, because the computers are used to take reservations, register campers and as cash registers for store sales! We got through it, though, and everyone is still friends.

There were some other problems, too. We had to go buy a new phone because the kind of cell phone we had won't work any more due to some government regulation about tracking phone calls (due to 911). That was a huge hassle--I won't go into detail, but what a pain in the neck!

Then we had a bad storm in the middle of the night (7/4) and it blew down our awning, trapping us in the RV. We're waiting for the insurance adjuster now--we have a $500 deductible, so I suspect we'll be out at least that much. Plus the camper looks awful right now, and we're sitting in a very prominent spot in the campground, so I know the owners want us to take down the remnants soon!

To top it all off, the campground store was robbed last night! So this morning was chaotic--trying to do business as usual and not alarm the campers while a police officer took pictures in the store. I feel very bad for the owners--they're so pleasant and generous! They had activities for the kids all day yesterday. We're still having a great time working here.

I'm going to download some pics of the fun time we had when my son and his family visited last weekend and I'll post them on another blog soon. I just wanted to let everyone know what's been going on and why I haven't posted lately.