Preparation: Campsites booked on Sunday, May 15, 2005 on the Indiana DNR website. The cost was $23 per site per night, so $46 per family. We originally booked sites 1 and 2 in the West Loop and sites 83 and 84 in the East Loop to have a little area to ourselves, but we ended up only needing 3 sites, so site #2 was cancelled on July 19, 2005 for a $10 cancellation fee.
Camping Checklist: Basics:
FOOD:
bacon… (?)
that we can bring with us to the beach
The firepit works, but the sides are so high it's hard to build a fire up enough to cook anything.
ED/ERICA ARE BRINGING::
FOR THE DOG(S):
We packed up our stuff, then headed over to Lya and Gary's so they could follow us. After they got their stuff together, Gary came back from the store, and the neighbor was left with instructions on feeding their fish, we took off.
First stop was ~McDonalds to grab a bite to eat. Ed and I got through the drive-thru and waited for Lya and Gary's order. It was taking a long time. We were hungry. Perhaps we could just munch on the fries that fell out of their box… Still waiting -and halfway through our fries. We both moved onto our burgers… Still waiting. A page comes in from Lya: “I think we broke them.” Ed and I finished our meals and through our garbage away, then Lya and Gary were sent to the parking lot to wait for their food. Eventually they were served, the kids got a potty break, and we were finally off once more. On the way we had a detour due to a tanker truck roll-over on the expressway, but Ed got us back on track fairly quickly.
We arrived at the Dunes late -between 8:30 and 9pm, but the guard house was still open, so we had to pay our $8 per car to get in. Once we got through the gates we drove to the campground, checked in and quickly found our spots -1, 83, and 84. We were right inbetween the bathroom and the campstore and right next to a water fill station. The traffic wasn't bad, the site wasn't as treed as some, but it wasn't ever a problem. The sites weren't nearly as good as the ones on the north side, but the convenince of having the camp store close was nice.
Mike and Ai arrived about an hour later and ended up setting up their tent near ours. We were all on sites #1 and #83. We only used #84 to park Mike's SUV and we also stole it's picnic table. I think we could have gotten away with only booking sites #1 and #83.
Mike brought firewood, so we built a fire and relaxed until about midnight when we all hit the sack to prepare for a day on the beach the next day. We woke up early Saturday morning and had pancakes, eggs, and bacon for breakfast. We went through more than a dozen eggs I think! Breakfast was good, but as we packed up for the hike to the beach it started to drizzle. Luckily the showers only lasted a few minutes, so we packed up some sandwiches for lunch and hit the trail. At about 11am we took trail 7 straight to the beach, which was almost empty when we got there, but two large groups arrived right after us, so we had to watch 42 closely.
We swam and played fetch while Mike and Ai tried to get their dog introduced to the water. Sebastian wasn't too sure about the water at first, but warmed up to the idea later on. Lya, Gary, Katya and the kids ended up going down to the public beach because the sand was covered in tons of these flying insects. I haven't been able to identify what they were, but they looked like shorter lightning bugs, but they were all tan? The lifeguard said they were potato bugs or something, but that's not what they are… He said they come in with the tide. I don't know… Ed said he was bit by one, but I never was. They were in the sand, but swarmed around the driftwood. They also seemed to be attracted to Gary's white shirt. -There were very few in the water, so they never bothered me or Ed.
Twice we were kicked out of the water by lifeguards who'd come down the beach on a four-wheeler. Apparently dogs are allowed to swim there, but not people.
After awhile Gary came down to get some sandwiches (they were all in my backpack). We decided to walk back to the public beach with him so we could all eat together. The dogs weren't supposed to be on the beach, but we were on the border of the public beach and other dogs were around… -No one ever said anything to us.
We ate our sandwhiches, then headed back to the water. The kids were having a ball out in the lake and on the sand. I think it was about 2:30pm when we started back to the campsite via the “beach trail” right off the parking lot. The kids were running, but the adults were dragging from the hike and all the swimming. The day was overcast, but Ed ended up getting sunburned on his chest, back, neck and face. Next time we'll have to remember to put on sunblock on whether there's sun or not!
Whe we arrived back at the campsite, one of the guys from the park was going around telling everyone that there was a storm warning issued for tonight. We all rested, then started making dinner incase a storm hit and we became tent-bound for the night. It seems we all brought something for dinner, so we had a combination of burgers, hot dogs, brats, steak, chili, and cornbread. It ended up showering on us briefly, but again, it only lasted about 15 minutes and it never rained hard enough for me to run for shelter.
After dinner, we made another fire. The firewood Mike brought caught quickly and we kept it going with the more moist (and rotten) firewood from the campstore. Smores were made, of course, and we spent the rest of the night talking and sitting around the fire. We broke for bed around midnight again, and had no more rain overnight. In the morning Lya made us all omeletes, and we had more bacon and some sausage to go with it.
We packed up, divided Ai's awesome cookies and headed for the road around 10am. It sounded like everyone had a good time, and Lya mentioned doing this again -maybe closer to fall. I hope we do, I had a great time!
On the way home we stopped and visited my Dad in UIC hospital. We had a pretty good visit while the dog stayed out in the car. It was about 104 degrees out, but he was in the shade in the parking garage with the windows cracked. It never got very hot in there.
We got home around 1pm, unpacked, took a much-needed shower and spent the rest of the blistering hot day in the movie theater watching “The Island”. The dog crashed on the floor as soon as we got home.
Hindsight:
There was minimal planning for this trip considering Ed and I were the only ones who had been camping before. It worked out pretty well, though.
Stuff we had that was useful:
bad thing…Stuff we wished we had had:
Stuff we brought but never used: