We have enjoyed our week in Muskegon, Michigan but sadly, it’s time to leave and get on down the road. But we sure have had a wonderful time in this friendly lakeside community.

We stayed at Fisherman’s Landing, a city owned marina and campground, where our back-in RV site had a concrete pad with picnic table, water and 30 amp electric, and a dump station, all for $25 a night. Actually two of those nights were only $12.50, with our Passport America discount, which is good for two nights in any 30 day period. The campground has 70 RV sites, and is located on a lake that connects to the Muskegon River. We did not need them in our self-contained bus conversion, but Fisherman’s Landing also has restrooms with showers and flush toilets.

How friendly is Muskegon? When we returned to our bus late last night after spending our last evening with my cousin Berni and her husband Rocky, we found a business card stuck in our door from city commissioner Steven Wisneski, along with a stack of goodies he had left for us that included two folding chairs in cloth bags, and two goodie bags packed with gifts like water bottles, can cozies, and keychain flashlights, along with a big collection of brochures about local attractions. You can bet we’ll be returning to Muskegon again! It’s one of our favorite places to visit, and I can certainly understand why Rocky and Berni chose this area to live in when they stopped fulltiming.

The city and surrounding area have a lot to offer visitors, from fishing and water sports, to neat museums, great restaurants (we ate out six of the seven nights we were in town, at a different  restaurant each time, and never had a bad meal), a wonderful farmer’s market, and some of the nicest people we have met anywhere.

And the fun doesn’t stop at the end of summer! The Muskegon area is a year round playground, with a winter sports complex, cross country skiing, snow shoeing, and ice fishing. At least Rocky tells me so. I hope to be in Key West by the time the first snow falls!

I wrote in yesterday’s blog that we hoped to do some more paddling before we left town, so yesterday after Berni and Rocky got off work we put our kayaks in the Muskegon River and paddled for a couple of hours. This time we were smart and paddled upriver against the current starting out, while we were still fresh, and allowed the current to carry us back to our launch point when we were done.

We poked into a couple of channels that led off the river and up into some small islands. At one point the channel we were paddling wasn’t more than a few feet wide, and the water under us was choked with weeds. Our kayaks did fine, but a regular boat would have had a hard time of it.

I was in the lead, and as I rounded one bend in the waterway a beaver or muskrat swam across and disappeared into the cattails on the bank as I approached, and soon after that I drifted around another curve and startled three great blue heron, who took flight at my intrusion into their little sanctuary.

Now that’s why we love kayaking! You can have your motor boats and jet skis. We much prefer the slower, quiet ride that allows us to get up close and personal with Mother Nature. As much as I love our life on the open road, I have to admit that I am just a little bit jealous of Rocky and Berni for having this wonderful place only a minute or two from their front door.

We’re heading back to Elkhart Campground in Elkhart, Indiana today, and we’ll be there for a few days before we head over to Bowling Green, Ohio for the FMCA rally, if they have an open vendor booth for us. It’s been a fun mini-vacation.

Thought For The Day – Wisdom consists of the anticipation of consequences.

Register Now For Our Ohio Gypsy Gathering Rally

In a blog post titled Am I a Full-timer? I think so… on the RV.Net Blog, Tony Cornett, known as Firedude to his many followers, writes about going to visit family in his old hometown over Easter, and realizing he is indeed a fulltime RVer, not just a weekend warrior.

Some of the clues were subtle, such as wandering through his brother’s home and being amazed at how much “stuff” they have, or that his brother has more stuff crammed into his garage than Tony has in his entire RV.

Other clues were more obvious and we’ve experienced them ourselves when visiting family and friends. Have you ever tried to flush the toilet in somebody’s house with your foot? If you have, you might be a fulltimer! Been there, done that. How about staying at a friend’s house, and turning the water off in the shower while you lather up? My friend Terry Simpson says that when he returns to his home in Mitchell, Indiana after a winter on the road in his bus conversion, he does the same thing.

Tony’s column hit home with me because we are currently visiting our old hometown of Show Low, Arizona. We’ve enjoyed visiting with my daughter and her family, and our friends here, but I’m amazed at how much space they take up and how much stuff they have to fill that space. My daughter and son-in-law live in a rather small two bedroom apartment, which gets cramped with two little girls growing up fast in it, but their place seems huge to us.

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day and he said he envied the fact that we have escaped the rat race. He knew us back in the days when we worked 60, 70 or more hours a week. He had just returned from a visit to his wife’s family, down in the Phoenix area, and said it was sad how her kids and grandkids were fixated on having the newest electronic gadgets, or the latest and greatest hybrid yuppie-mobile. Terry and I don’t need much more in life than each other, a gentle tailwind when we’re going down the highway, and a level, quiet place to park for the night.

Unlike Tony, we have not driven by our old house while we’ve been in town. The place holds no special significance for us. It was just a place to eat and sleep in between our workaholic days. When we left, we put that part of our lives behind us.

But we’ve felt at home all over this country, whether we’re parked in a nice campground on the Texas Gulf Coast, boondocking under a starry desert sky, or grabbing a few hours’ sleep in a highway rest area or Wally World parking lot. We could never go back to our old lives.

In yesterday’s blog I mentioned the fishing opportunities here in Arizona’s White Mountains. While trout, bass, and walleye are the big three for anglers who fish our local waters, one often overlooked species are catfish. But there are some real lunkers waiting for the lucky fisherman (or fisherwoman) who knows how to hook them.

Here is one my son-in-law, Jim, caught yesterday evening at Fool Hollow Lake here in Show Low. The 150 acre lake is part of Fool Hollow Recreation Area, an Arizona State Park that includes 92 RV sites, many with full hookups, as well as 31 primitive sites. Fool Hollow got its name when an early settler began to farm the land now covered by the lake’s waters, and his neighbors joked that “Only a fool would plow that hollow.”

The lake is also popular with bird watchers, who come to spot a wide range of species, including Mallard and Canada geese, Great Blue Heron, Snowy Egret, American Egret, White-faced Ibis, Stellar’s Jay, Lesser Goldfinch, Blue Birds, Acorn Woodpeckers, Nuthatches, and Red-shafted Flicker. Raptors commonly seen are Bald Eagles in the winter, Osprey in the summer, American Kestrel, Northern Harrier and Goshawk. It’s one of our favorite places to stay when visiting our old hometown.

Thought For The Day – Cleaning your house while the kids are still living at home is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing.

Register Now For Our Ohio Gypsy Gathering Rally