Sept 26th to 28th - MI to IL

Sept 26th - Fri - to Rapid River, MI
Said farewell to our great hosts at Worthy Acres (that would be Harold & Jo Worth). Hate to leave since we had such a good time but the weather is getting cooler at night and we hate to overstay our welcome anywhere.
We decided to head north through the Upper Peninsula (known as U.P. to all around this area) and then into Wisconsin tomorrow. Uneventful drive through increasingly flatter countryside. There is a long toll ($6.00) bridge to the U.P. that is very high to allow ships to pass. On the other side we stopped at a welcome center to make some lunch. Just as we were leaving, an employee came by and asked if we had any firewood. We had a bag that we got in PEI. Terry had to dump it out so he could check the species and make sure there was no bark on types of wood that could bring insects into the area. Our wood was fine.
We took a road along Lake Michigan where there were sand dunes and lots of sandy beaches. There was too much fog/haze and a lack of large pull-outs to get any pictures. We stayed at a PA park (Vagabond Resort) in Rapid River. It was on the lake but had no “beach”, just a long dock through reeds on the shallow shore. After a walk to get the kinks out, we took advantage of a nice afternoon, a firepit and some time to use up the PEI wood.

Sept 27th - Sat - to Lodi, Wisconsin
We are just tearing through the states. I think this will be the case until we get all the states covered on our map according to our rule of staying at least one night in the state in our rig. We will be heading east again after a stay in Illinois.
There is more color in the trees & shrubs but not eye-popping yet. Getting into more farmland - lots of corn fields and some soybeans. We paid the lowest price for a long time for diesel - $3.87.
Our current route is mainly designed to avoid Chicago. We have been encountering quite a bit of road construction with narrow, temporary lanes requiring all of Terry’s attention and skill.
We stayed at Smokey Hollow CG in Lodi. It is great for kids - a large, aerated pond with a huge, inflatable slide/raft/etc contraption, all sorts of “wheels” for kids to peddle, an inflated jumping pillow, a small theater and regular playground equipment. Lots of seasonal campers. Unfortunately, not enough owners of large rigs have complained so it was hard to negotiate turns and we had to move to a second site as we could not raise the front of the rig enough to get level. Oh well, all is good when the sun shines!

Sept 28th - Sun - to Kankakee, Illinois
Kind of interesting day today. I wanted to post the blog and vacuum before leaving. I was entering the blog while Terry was outside putting things away and the power goes off. So I figure he is in a hurry and started shutting down the computer. He said “no, we aren’t in a hurry so finish the blog and vacuuming”. Well, I get kind of cranky when he unhooks before I am done so I said “forget it, let’s go”. Terry had already asked the campers across from us to move their truck so we could swing wide enough to get out of our spot so away we went.
Since we weren’t in a hurry, we decided to avoid a toll highway and took a state route through Rockford WI. Turned out to have a long stretch of narrow road under construction and went through a pretty rough looking part of town. We weren’t able to find a PA or CCUSA park on our route so we figured we would just find a site on the way. Didn’t realize that we were going through the “corn belt’ and it appears no one camps in this area. We finally found an RV park in the GPS and headed that way. Wanda announced that we had reached our destination when the only thing to be seen was corn fields and a straight road with no where to turn around. A mile later, the campground sign shows up. We drove into a rough gravel road to a rougher looking campground with large puddles and muddy spots. Turns out they had received 11 inches of rain from the end of a hurricane and had been flooded. The lady offered us a spot beside a shed but I had noticed swarms of mosquitoes when walked through water-flattened grass so we said no thanks and left.
There was a KOA also in the GPS so we figured we would have to bite the bullet and pay their inflated rate. We needed to stop for diesel on the way and what should be next to a handy service station but a WalMart Superstore. Home for the night!
Checked with WalMart about staying, got some groceries including some great, already-cooked King Tso chicken and had our first meal of the day - oh yes, we were going to have lunch at a rest stop but there was such a stink in the air (cattle?) that we continued on without eating.