Tony's First Venture into the World of RVs

Big day today. This is the start of a trip with Tony. Tony has been rather hesitant to join me on my RV adventures. The whole idea of travel is not something that appeals to him. He truly loves his home and because his home is so satisfying to him, he doesn't see much point in travel. Since I am sort of on the opposite end of the spectrum, it has been rather difficult to span that gap in a way that would make both of us happy. Tony has graciously agreed to venture out and see where the road leads us. Not only that, he agreed to go for a week and a half. This is huge. Of course his week and a half is different than my week and a half, but I'm sure that we will work something out.

We decided to go to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and along the south shore of Lake Superior. Several tasks will be accomplished. I will be able to knock off three more National Sites and Tony will be able to see what life on the road is like. I have tentatively planned a partial itinerary, some of it will be as the wind blows.

We spent the last few days getting everything ready. I told Tony that this will be just like living at home and he took me seriously. Let's just say, Tony does not pack light. We got everything loaded up and ready to hit the road.

I bought a new rug for the RV.  I wish it was a little bit bigger, but I think it works.  You can see where Miko's bed is right by the driver's seat.

 

The other big thing today is this is the first road trip where I am towing my car behind the new RV. I used to have a trailer that I would drive the front wheels of my car up on and tow that behind the RV. The setup I have now is totally different. I had a base plate installed on my car which allows me to tow the car with all four wheels on the ground. After spending about ten minutes hooking it up this morning and then towing it behind my RV, four wheels on the ground is definitely the way to go. Super easy, I can't even tell it is back there. The main benefit though is how easy it is to hook and unhook the car.

We took off about 10:30 from River Falls and headed straight east across Wisconsin. Mostly four lane highways until the last hour when we got off the main drag and started going through some of the tiny little towns in rural Wisconsin. What is so interesting about Wisconsin is that no matter how small a town is, there will always be a minimum of two bars. Each bar would have several locals hanging out in front on the sidewalks. We rolled into the campground around 3:30.

We ended up in Oconto Wisconsin which is just about 30 miles north of Green Bay. We are at the Holtwood Campground, right on the Oconto river. Not a lot of charm, but it is passable for an overnight visit. There are two types of camping spots, the type where you have to back in and the pull thru ones which is what I really wanted so I did not have to unhook the car. Settled in and about the time we got everything hooked up, two guys showed up and told us that we had to move because we had parked in a reserved spot. Of course, they had forgotten to put up reserved signs so there was no way we could have known. We had to move because there where three rigs coming in, each of which were seventy feet long (RV plus they were towing very big trailers) These made my RV look like a baby RV. The managers apologized up and down about the hassle and ended up giving us a free night of camping for our troubles. One of the managers (the slightly inebriated one) went so far as to tell us that we needed to come back again sometime and we could have a whole weekend free. Hmmmm.

Showed Tony how to set up the RV, washed the windshield and then had some sort of frozen dinner. Day 1 completed and everybody is still happy. Well, maybe not Miko – she has such a hard time traveling, I really do think she gets a little sick. She seems to have recovered although I'm sure she is not going to be happy when we have to road trip again tomorrow.