Clear cutting the entire states of both Michigan and Wisconsin at the turn of the century left unbelievable devastation. Never again? We still have huge swaths of ugly clear-cutting in our two states.

Logging, from what I have seen in Germany, seems to be so more intelligent. They selectively thin out their forests and wood chip the branches. Ironically, this selective cutting technique improves the forest's appearance without leaving a nuclear holocaust. It takes more time and is more expensive to do it that way. Ah, the price of ecology that we are not willing to pay. Of course, Germany devastated their forests 500 to 1000 years ago, so they had to learn the hard way, too. 

We had ambitious plans today. They didn’t quite pan out. That’s the way it is somedays. Still, the day was pleasant, just not ambitious.

The move from the eastern side of the LP to the interior worked in our favor. As I have observed, many Michigan State Campgrounds, with some exceptions, are cramped. Hartwick Pines State Campground, just outside of Greyling, was one of those exceptions. Our site had plenty of secluded elbow room. The bathroom and showers were, like Thurston Park, modern and clean. Some sites, for the Big Boys, had electrical, water, and sewer hookups. Our site just had electricity. At a whopping $35, that was enough.

Here is where Boondockers Welcome kind of let us down. No, that’s too harsh. Let’s just say that we discovered BW’s limitation. We originally submitted a request for a stay at a BW site in the Greyling area. I am assuming that the host never saw our request. We were never approved, nor disapproved. We remained in “Request-Pending” limbo. After two weeks, we had to cancel that request and book our stay at Hartwick Pines.

It still blows my mind that so many hosts are so generous as to share their property for practically nothing, that I can’t say anything negative about a host that didn’t keep up with the BW calendar. It’s just the nature of the BW system - no biggie!

OK, so here is where the ambition part abandoned us. After setting up, we were going to hike some of the trails in the park, then scout out a section of the Au Sable River to kayak. Well, Hartwick Pines wasn’t keen on letting us set before 3 pm. We had some 2 hours to kill. Hartwick has a lumber museum so we drove down to the museum and, instead of hiking, got caught up in that.

Being from logged and lumbered to death Wisconsin, we pretty well knew the logging legacy of the 1890s through 1930s, with the raping of the old majestic pine wilderness. Yet, somehow, we got interested in the presentation at Hartwick Pines. One thing Michigan does well is to bring its old-world buildings to life with authentic furnishings, outstanding old sepia and black-and-white photos, and good story-telling.

The logging museum was housed in this log pavillion.

Many rooms in the museum essentially recreated an old logging camp. This was the bunk room. Three loggers shared each bunk bed at a time. The bunks rotated like an on a submarine so that they were always being used. This is called "hot bunking".

A recreated dining room.

A recreated kitchen.

Noteworthy photos from the lumber camps.

It was 4 pm by the time we hit one of Hartwick Pines’ trails. We picked a short 2-miler because we wanted to head up to the nearby Otsego State Park to check out the big Otsego Lake up there. We decided to postpone scouting the Au Sable River until tomorrow. The trail we chose was the Bright & Glory Lakes Trail. These two spring-fed lakes were tiny but crystal clear. Both had floating fishing docks and visibility was at least 15 feet deep. Plenty of decent-sized fish were playing in the docks' shadow.

Campsite #49 at Hartwick Pines State Park.

The Hartwick Visitor Center also has a number of interesting displays.

The trailhead for the Bright & Glory Lakes Trail.

Otsego State Park had the closest swimming beach in the area. It also had a campground right on the lake. As per typical of Michigan campgrounds, it was packed in. We smugly smiled at our roomy digs at Hartwick Pines. 

Otsego was yet another exquisite northern LP lake. Tomorrow and Thursday promises to reach 90º. Where did that come from? It has been chilly for two weeks, and now 90º? A little transition - maybe?!?!

The beach at Otsego State Park. Otsego is about 20 miles north of Hartwick Pines State Park.

Glossary of terms used for newcomers: 1) V-Jer. The name of our camper. 2) Saturn. The name of our Van. 3) Duende. Our mischievous gremlin that breaks things. 4) Tata. The good gremlin that helps us fix Duende’s dirty work. 5) The Black Hole. This is what we call Walmart because every time we go in for just a couple of items, we come out spending way more than we figured. 6) QT. Quaint Town. 7) Little Buddy. This is what we call our Dyson cordless stick vacuum.

Dave and Wanda

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