The snow is melting, the roads are clearing, I’ll soon be commuting on the scooter, and it’s already almost too late to start making reservations for this year’s road trip. I keep forgetting how quickly Ludington State Park can get booked: I just managed to get the very last campsite available the night I want to stay there … in mid July. The night in question is a Friday (which is why it’s so popular), and there are a good selection of open spots to choose from on some other nights, but I have constraints on what day of the week I need to leave, because the ferry to Isle Royale doesn’t run every day.
(If I didn’t get this campsite, I would’ve had the option of booking one of the rustic hike-in sites at Ludington, but those are a mile away from the road. Under most circumstances that wouldn’t bother me, but I have a ferry to get to first thing in the morning, and I don’t want to have to factor in a trek through the dunes carrying my gear.)
So I guess I’ve just nailed down the dates for this trip. I’ll ride up to Ludington the afternoon of Friday the 18th, then take the Badger to Wisconsin the next morning and ride up to Wells State Park just north of the Michigan border. I’ll then spend two days riding the rest of the way to Copper Harbor, more or less due north. I’ll take the Isle Royale Queen IV to the Island, spend two nights there, and take it back to Copper Harbor the third day. Next I ride southwest to the Porcupine Mountains and Lake of the Clouds. From there I’ll turn southeastward, and spend a night in the Wisconsin highlands. That’s followed by an all-day ride to catch an overnight crossing of the Badger, then ride home in the morning. In summary: 4 days up, 3 days for Isle Royale, and 4 days back down.
That’s a day less than I’d planned for last year. I accomplished that by charting a different route through the 8 counties still on my “to visit” list, and taking a shortcut across Wisconsin that last day instead of taking a detour to hit one last county. Not that I don’t enjoy the time on the road, but … 11 days away from home is long enough.