Gone Camping

So jackie and I have been planning on going camping for a few months now with Jordan, Brad, Beth and Erin.. Since it was already paid for, we went ahead and went. We had 2 spots at orchard beach state park in Manistee, MI- very nice place. The trip went something like this:

Friday:
10:40 am, went shopping together, bought an assload of food.
3 pm, got to manistee and checked in, put up our tents, and lounged
6 pm, ate hotdogs
8 pm, heavy rain started, found out the tent leaked

Saturday:
7am, found out we fared better than jordan and bet as far as getting wet went. Scrambled eggs and bacon for breakfast
stuff
4 pm, went down to the beach
6 pm, started a game of runebound (a boardgame), played until we had to eat. made a kickass fire that was way too hot
9 pm, ate steak. fire was too hot and the sun went down quick.

Sunday:
7 am, got up, started the fire. Jackie made pancakes on the camping stove.
10 pm, started runebound early, ended up giving up cause the expansion game is just too long
2 pm, brats ( I think)?
7 pm, ate hamburgers
8 pm, went to the beach again, froze my junk off.
9 pm, helped jackie lose at poker. watched people play roulette shot checkers with vodka and water. quite amusing.
3 am, stayed up talking to beth about all sorts of random things

Monday:
7 am, burned the rest of the wood, had leftovers.
9:40, left to go back to Grand Rapids. Poured on the way home and most of the rest of the day.

It was a lot of fun, and there’s talk of doing it again. I’m looking forward to it- the weekend after labor day worked well- it was chilly and rained a bit, but there were only 25 lots out of 165 filled. We ended up taking up 4 lots instead of two. 🙂 It was also a really good reset point for me; tomorrow I’m going to start fresh on the job search.
So what did we learn from all of this?

Wood is Expensive
Manistee has problems with a certain wood bore pest, so wood can’t be brought in from outside the county. that means woodprices are high. we went through $70+ worth of wood.

Toasted Twislers
soft and chewy twislers are good, but don’t singe them or they taste like ass.

Last Day Leftovers
Plan your meals well, but leave the last day for leftovers. worst case scenario, you go out to eat.

Community Shopping
We spent way too much on food, and part of that was because we egged each other on. we didn’t need 5 lbs of twislers, or 8 bags of chips, etc.

Vented Tents are Cold
Jackie and my tent was mesh on the top with a fly that staked down over the top- since we were near the lake, the wind rushed in and froze us all night.

Air Mattress
That ground is hard. I have a bad back. airmattress would have been good.

Too-Hot Fire
a Fire can be too hot for cooking- make sure you keep it decent, but remember you gotta pull the food off the wire rack.

Buckets
buckets are useful; bring one.

Head Uphill
sleep with your head uphill or you’ll have sinus problems.

Shot Checkers
If you bring shot checkers, make sure you bring alcohol you like. (side note: I watched, I didn’t participate)

Night Cooking
Make sure you aren’t trying to tell if meat is cooked or not if you cook at night. raw steak in the center is bad.

Tenderize Meat
since you have cold meat sitting in the cooler, you might as well tenderize it.

Jordan + Seasoning == bad
He killed some of the burgers with montreal steak seasoning:)

Tarp Folds Under
we placed a tarp under our tent to help with ground condensation- make sure if the tarp is too big that you fold the edges under itself so water doesn’t pool.

Unh… Unh… weeeeeeeee
Make sure everyone gets the joke and sees the video

Rubber Shoes + Fire == bad
Keep your feet away from the fire if your shoes are rubber soled.

Anything else I’m missing?