Bay City State Park day 4

On Monday, with all the Christmas stuff going on it was off to Frankenmuth and the worlds largest Christmas Store, Bronner's. I'm not kidding, when you go in they give you a map! And you'll need it to find your way back out! The purpose of this trip, was to see if we could find the same lights that we have on the Christmas Tree we put up at work. We've had them a number of years, and although I bought a few extra sets, I'm nearly out of replacement bulbs as they are slowly burning out. Well, as big as this place was, and with literally hundreds of sets of lights, ours was not to be found. Oh well, I guess we'll just have to shop Frankenmuth instead. And Frankenmuth is a neat little city. Very Bavarian. This pic below is the visitors center across the street from Tiffany's, a nice restaurant we ate lunch at on their outdoor patio.

And they have this cool covered bridge, this neat waterfall,

and even a riverboat for tours.

Didn't find much to buy, but it was a nice day. Then back to the park for more biking and then breaking down the campsite for the next morning's drive back home. And a light dinner of Sausage Wraps.

And the best part? We arrived back home from this trip without an 'incident'!

Bay City State Park, day 2 and 3

And now about our trip.

A lot of our customers were wondering why we were going to the Bay City area, and our response was we've never been there. And each year we try to add a few new places to our yearly favorites. And we've never 'camped' on the east side of the state. The campground is right on Saginaw Bay of Lake Huron. And near the 3 cities of Bay City, Saginaw, and Midland. so we felt there was a lot to explore. The first day took us to Bay City where they were having sidewalk sales and a street festival. Very disappointing. Nothing really worth shopping at. Though the music was good. Seems like a typical midsized city with a lot of empty store fronts. We did find a historic district with 3 blocks of mostly bars and restaurants where we had a nice lunch and enjoyed some very cool old architecture. The campground was a typical Michigan State Park. Cram in as many campsites as you can get. We did get a decent one though. Got a site in an outer row with a parking area on one side, so only one camper on just one side of us. We were surprised to see so many sites filled when we arrived, since we checked in around 1pm. All these people must have come in Thursday or earlier. And then we found out why, Christmas In July! Yuk! Christmas decorations everywhere! Now don't get me wrong, I enjoy holidays, but Christmas makes me think of winter, and I'm sure not ready for another one Yet. But they had a site competition, and we went around Sat evening and voted for our favorite 3. And they all won, though not in the order we pickedOn Sunday, it was off to Saginaw, where they were having a classic car show. Now this was very cool! 6 blocks of cars in old town Saginaw. They were selling passes for $10 and with that you got in drawings all day for prizes, and the area restaurants and bars were giving out free food samples for those with tickets.

And for those of you interested, here's the link to more classic car pics.

So after a very cold start to the day, it warmed up to near 70 and sunny. Back at the campground, we bike a few trails, and cooked steaks on the grill for dinner.

And tomorrow, the rest of the story!

Bay City State Recreation Area

We've just returned from a long weekend trip to Bay City State recreation area. Why it's not called a State Park and instead a recreation area is a mystery to me.
Now the posts you read on Saturday and Monday were prewritten on Thursday, and post dated so no one would suspect we were out of town. Fooled you didn't I?
But anyway, we had a good time despite the coldest weekend in July ever!
Nearby Saginaw MI and Flint MI reached a record low high of 67 on Saturday. That means Saginaw and Flint have never ever had a high temperture for that day that low. The normal high should be in the mid 80's. So, does somebody want to try and convince me we should be worried about global warming? Come to Michigan and try!
But like I said, we had a good time. We have a mo-ho, not a tent like a lot of the poor campers. And we had a warm ragging fire every night. And as soon as I get the pics uploaded from the camera, I'll tell you all about our trip.