Around Our Campfire

We spent our first camping trip of the 2017 season at Charles Mears State Park in Pentwater, Michigan.  This park fills quickly during the summer months, but in mid-April, most sites remain open.  The campground is located right on the shores of Lake Michigan.  It has two loops of campsites, and we chose to stay in the loop closest to Lake Michigan.  The 5-6 sites closest to the entrance along Lake Michigan have views of the water, and the remaining sites have a small dune between them and the Lake.  The dune is not too tall to climb, and has several established trails to the water.  The top of the dune has a few benches spaced out from one another, which would provide an excellent place to sit and watch a summer sunset.  The sites with Lake Michigan views also have the general beach access parking lot between them and the water.  Being mid-April (although unseasonably warm), there were not many people coming to ...

The camping season begins today!  Our camper emerged from its winter storage location today! We choose to store our camper indoors for the winter.  It's not cheap, but it is worth the investment to not have any snow or ice pile up on the roof and to not have to worry about the effects of water freezing and thawing on the camper all winter.  We use DC Storage  and are very happy with the service they provide.  Our camper gets winterized before heading to storage (even though it is indoors, we opted for unheated storage) and then cleaned out in the spring.  Drop-off and pick-up are very easy (I just have to give DC an email heads up a couple weeks in advance), and the facilities at DC Storage are kept clean and free from rodents and bugs.  Plus, the monthly payment is automatically drawn on our credit card, so there's no forgetting to pay the storage fees.  I highly recommend DC Storage for your camper's winter home! This weekend, I'll work ...

Welcome to Around Our Campfire!  We spend lots of time during the spring, summer and fall camping, and we love to share our stories and experiences.  We figured a blog would be a great way to journal our experiences and share them with all of you.  We hope you'll follow along with our camping adventures.  You might be following along just to see our latest destination, to learn more about us, or to get pointers and suggestions for your own camping adventures.  Regardless of why you're here, we're glad that you're along for the ride! Who are we?  We're a family of 3 humans and one spoiled Basset Hound from Michigan.  We spend several weekends each summer camping in various locations (almost all in Michigan).  We're no camping experts, just the casual weekend campers who like to relax with the conveniences of an RV. We're still relatively new to the RV experience as a family.  One of us grew up camping often with family in a Class C motorho...