A Rest Day and A Family Day - Tues. & Wed., Oct. 14-15, 2014

Monday's blog was so long that I saved part of it for today. After we finished at The Henry Ford Museum, we drove 45 minutes to Chelsea to meet Connie, one of my younger cousins I do not remember meeting before, her husband Mike and their three boys: David, Jack, and Nicholas. My camera battery was dead from all the photos at The Henry Ford Museum, so no photos.

Our family has a private family campground on a pond in the country. We were invited to stay there and were checking to make sure we could get in and out with the 5th wheel. Connie, Bob, David, Nicholas and I walked down to the camp area. It is lovely, so bucolic with beautiful green hills, fall colors and a small lake. We loved it! Family history was discussed while we walked.

We'll be going out to spend Saturday night and possibly Sunday night. Plus another cousin and her husband will be there Saturday during the day and we'll all have lunch together. On Sunday I'll learn more family history. This time my camera will be charged up and ready to go.

Tuesday we hung out at the 5th wheel which was nice for a change. Throughout the day it rained on and off, but the temperature was about 69 degrees. When it wasn't raining we had our windows open. The rain sounded so nice on the RV roof. Bob remarked we didn't move the truck all day.

Bowie loved the open windows

Bowie posing

A couple of times during the day, a red-tailed hawk sailed past our 5th wheel low to the ground, then landed on a fence near the RV storage. I was able to get close enough for photos.

Red-tailed hawk

Wednesday, we shopped at Costco. My Aunt Flora and Uncle Omar invited us to their home at 2 p.m. where we chatted the afternoon away, had snacks, and looked at photos Aunt Flora had of family history. We loved seeing everyone when they were younger. I had never seen a photo of my dad when he was little, and blonde! Flora also told me my dad's father worked on a freighter on the Great Lakes. I never knew that before either.

Anyway, we had a wonderful time reconnecting with Aunt Flora and Uncle Omar. I have not seen them for six years. While we were sitting at their dining table talking, Mom called. She was able to talk to Aunt Flora too.

Flora and Omar took us out to dinner at Metzger's, a German restaurant in Dexter, Michigan. Their daughter-in-law Mary, grandson Daniel, and Mary's sister Lori joined us. We all got to know each other better over dinner.

Aunt Flora and Uncle Omar

Cousin-in-law Mary and her son Daniel

Mary, Daniel, Lori

Daniel with mussels

Restaurant decor

Uncle Omar and Bob

Mary, Daniel, Lori, Flora, Omar, Bob, and my coat

Cuckoo clocks on the walls

German restaurant

 I made a new kitty friend, Ollie the ragdoll cat.

Omar, Ollie and me, Daniel

Ollie again

When we were at Aunt Flora and Uncle Omar's for after-dinner dessert, Daniel sat down at the piano and started playing Rachmaninoff! He has never had formal training, just picked it up. We loved listening to him play. He had quite a playlist, including Claire de Lune, and The Entertainer. I had a video here, but the sound didn't work, so I took it out.

Aunt Flora served homemade apple cake which was yummy! We talked more and everyone headed home at 9 p.m. What a lovely day.

Travel Bug out.

Lansing, Michigan and Halloween is Tonight - Sat., Oct. 11, 2014

Yesterday at the Lansing Cottonwood Campground, I forgot to mention that we drove to our site, Bob backed the RV in quickly, we had the slides out and set-up done in about ten minutes. As Bob was hooking up the water and electric, the guy from the next site over walked up to him and told us we were in "his site."

That came as a bit of a shock to us. The pedestal for our site was directly behind our 5th wheel, but apparently, two sites share a pedestal and we were over the line for "his site." If we had moved our 5th wheel any farther to the side away from him, our full hook-up water and electric would not have reached the pedestal behind the 5th wheel. Our sewer hose for the grey water dump was out of reach behind the rig already.

Anyway, Bob apologized profusely, told him we didn't know we were in his site, and we would gladly move if we needed to. Bob told him we were only there overnight. He relented and since it was only for one night said not to worry about it. I should state that there are no defined sites, just grass, trees and pedestals at the back of the site. There was a big tree between us and the guy next to us.

The rest of Friday evening was free. Bob did a marathon training run along a river path by the RV park. I made chili and coleslaw for dinner.

This morning, we headed downtown an hour earlier than our walk start time so I could take photos and Bob could read history markers which would make our walk go a little faster. We also tried to tour the Capitol building, but due to budget cuts they were not open on Saturday or Sunday.

Pre-Volksmarch photos:

Lansing's cast iron Capitol dome and the moon

The following four photos are of a historic bank building. The concrete work looks a lot like Pianta, who did the concrete work on a number of buildings in San Antonio. See my blog from Tuesday, August 19.

Beautiful concrete art

An eagle with Mercury (?) on the right

Elephants over the front door of the bank

Beautiful entry (note the elephants)

Below is a beautiful building built over one of the streets.

The History Museum on Kalamazoo Ave., our start point.
Polaris sculpture on the left.

The museum building surrounds a white pine tree (the Michigan State Tree) and the Great Lakes Fountain with a tile mosaic.

Michigan white pine

At 10 a.m. we signed in for the walk at the History Museum. While we were signing in, the people who run the Capitol Volksmarch came in. They told us they were having a sponsored walk at 11 a.m. and invited us to join them. That would have been lovely if we didn't have to be back to collect our rig from the campground by 1 p.m. Volksmarchers are such friendly, inviting people.

We headed off with our directions on a 10K (6.2 mile) Capitol Volksmarch. The first points of interest came up quickly: the Michigan Hall of Justice (Supreme Court) and the Michigan Vietnam Memorial Monument.

Michigan Hall of Justice (Supreme Court)

It should be noted that Michigan's state Capitol was built without regard to using only Michigan materials. The goal was to build the Capitol within budget, so materials from all over the U.S., as well as some from abroad, were used.

We then walked the Capital Mall toward the Capitol, passed around behind it and entered an area with historic churches.

Central United Methodist Church

St. Mary Cathedral

Christ Community Church, Estab. 1851

Christ Community Church

After we walked through Durant Park, we saw the beautiful homes which grace Washington Avenue as we continued toward Old Town Lansing.

Durant Park Arch

Oh, hey, a squirrel snuck in here.

Old Town is the original site of the City of Lansing. We walked for a while along the Grand River, the longest river in Michigan.

Old Town and the Grand River

Grand River view

The Grand River

Along the river is a cute park with a cool playground. It invited us to play, so we obliged...

Teeter totter on steroids!

You can put a lot of people on this teeter totter.

Bob trying out another unique play structure.

He conquered it!

Bob loves seeing different stadiums wherever we go. Lansing is home to the Lugnuts and we passed by their stadium.

Bob in front of Cooley Law School Stadium

Notice the big lugnut. It's on the tower next
to the Nuthouse bar. Seriously.

It wouldn't be Michigan without car manufacturing plants. I am sorry to say, however, that they look like deserted ghost towns.

The GM Lansing Grand River plant where Cadillac ATS is built

It's huge!

History of Olds Motor Vehicle Company

The Curved Dash Runabout

On one of the streets downtown, we came across a star in the sidewalk commemorating Rosa Parks.

R.I.P. Rosa Parks

The ornate facade of an old theater downtown.

First Michigan Sharpshooter Memorial
on the capitol grounds.

It was already after noon and we had to be back to the RV park before 1 p.m. We decided to get lunches to go at Grand Traverse Pie Company. From there we quickly finished our walk, then headed back to hook up our 5th wheel and get out of Dodge, er, I mean Lansing. We checked out a few minutes after 1 p.m. and headed to Ypsilanti's Detroit-Greenfield RV Park.

On the short drive to Ypsilanti, I called Detroit-Greenfield RV Park to make a reservation for a full hook-up (FHU) pull-through site. At first, the gentleman said, "It's Halloween, we're pretty booked. I don't think we have a pull-through site." Then he talked to someone else and we waited on the line. After a few minutes, he came back on and said they had a site. Whew, that was a relief because there aren't many RV parks with FHUs in the area.

Couldn't understand about the Halloween comment, though, since last we checked Halloween is Oct. 31. Well, when we arrived at the RV park we were in for quite a shock. A line of parents and children snaked through the parking lot waiting their turn for hayrides, lots of children were in the playground, and the RV park was very full!

The office staff was very nice in directing us to our site. When we mentioned we planned to visit Greenfield Village and The Henry Ford Museum, they told us they sell discounted tickets there. For $29 each, we received tickets for two of the attractions at the complex and parking. That is quite a savings from the online deal Bob found.

With tickets and RV park map in hand, we slowly wound around past the line of kids on our way to our site. Then we wove our way through the trees in the RV park.

Packed in like sardines!

As we drove through we were amazed by the Halloween decorations at some of the sites. And not only did they have hay rides, but they also had pumpkin carving, site-decorating contest, and trick-or-treating through the park from 5:15 to 7:00 p.m. Wow. The park was a crazy-busy place!

After we parked the 5th wheel, we went to Kroger's to stock up on candy for the trick-or-treaters. When we returned to the park, Bob and I took a walk to see the decorations. Some people went all out. Apparently, local families camp out for the RV park "Halloween" every year. If you need ideas on how to decorate your RV for Halloween, take a look.

Bob and I loved this one!

Then it was time for the trick-or-treaters. So many kids came by. It was crazy. I don't think we've had that many since our kids were young! Wow.

Handing out the candy.

Then we took it easy for the rest of the night. Wow, sorry about the length of the blog. It was an eventful day.

Travel Bug out. (Finally!)