Category: Adventure Reports

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WanderLog Wisconsin

Ashland Wisconsin, the Apostle Islands, and Cheese

Travel Dates: August 18-26, 2015

After we explored Michigan’s Upper Peninsula along Lake Superior for 8 days, we made it back into northern Wisconsin and landed in Ashland. We gambled on a first come, first served waterfront city park and totally scored. Kreher City Park has a beach, a couple dozen sites, and is right on the water with a bike path running through it.

We stayed here for 5 days and it was perfect. We caught up on work and school, ate at Buddie’s Burgers (twice), road the 10 mile paved Ashland loop, went to the Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center where the kids earned their 75th Jr. Ranger Badge, and prepped for our upcoming backpack trip to the Apostle Islands.

Related blog posts:
Our Kids Earn Their 75th Jr. Ranger Badge
Sometimes We Just Need a Break

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We were up bright and early on a Sunday morning headed for the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore and our backpacking trip. It was amazing and so worth the time to get out to the islands. As a bonus, we even got to visit the Michigan Island Lighthouse on our way back!

Related blog posts:
Andrew’s 8th Birthday on the Apostle Islands
How We Backpacked on the Apostle Islands with Kids
Backpacking With Kids: 3 Day Meal Plan & Freezer Bag Cooking

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We had decided awhile ago that visiting Wisconsin didn’t count unless we bought local cheese, so before we left the Bayfield area we made that a priority.

Tetzner’s Dairy is a self-serve dairy farm that sells milk, cheese, and most importantly, ice cream. You walk into the shed, pick out your products, pay with cash or check and then walk out. The ice cream was delicious and we made some amazing grilled cheese with the Bacon Cheese.

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To finish out the Apostle Islands, we went up to Little Sand Bay hoping to visit the Sea Caves. Unfortunately, we underestimated how tired we would be, and no one wanted to hike the 5 mile round trip it required. So, we hung out at the campground and realized we would have been better off staying closer to Bayfield instead of driving all the way out there. Oops.

We did go into the Visitor Center and watch a movie about a modern Ojibwa making a North Canoe. The movie was fairly dated, but the girls & I were fascinated since we are obsessed with anything Voyageur related. Andrew was mostly just restless.

SAM_4291 Leaving the peninsula we headed towards Duluth, but were planning on overnighting at Walmart in Cloquet, MN to put us close to the mechanic for an appointment to check our trailer brakes.

Not wanting to arrive at Wal-Mart before dark, we hung out at Little Sand Bay until 2pm and then stopped by both Amnicon Falls State Park & Pattison State Park ($10 for a day pass gets you into all the state parks) to see the waterfalls. They are both small parks about 30 minutes apart and easily seen on the same day.

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We had dinner in the parking lot, and then we drove to the Wal-Mart in Cloquet, MN ready to begin traveling up the North Shore!

Categories
Homeschool National Parks

Our Kids Earn Their 75th Jr. Ranger Badge

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I often lose track of how many Jr. Ranger badges my kids have earned which got me into a little trouble when we hit 50 and didn’t know it. 50 badges seemed like a good milestone for celebrating and the kids were a little disappointed that we had skipped it.

“How about 70? 75?” I asked instead. “We could have a party.”

Knowing we were getting close, I kept a little better track in the last few months and last week the kids earned their 75th Jr. Range badge at the Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center near Ashland, WI. I’m so proud of them. Some of these books are pretty easy, but others take quite a bit of work and effort to complete. (See our list of badges here.)

There was also those couple of weeks in Arizona earlier this year where they earned 3 one week and then another 5 two weeks later. I think we were all Jr. Rangered out after that for a little while!

I encourage the kids to wear either their badge covered hat or vest when we pass off a new badge. Sometimes they get embarrassed because complete and total strangers want to take their photos, but I find that most rangers really appreciate seeing kids excited about the program. Its almost like a “thank you” to them for all the hard work they do to educate kids about our nation’s awesome parks.

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Jr. Ranger badges also count as “school” for the day. Instead of doing their regular book assignments, we’ll count the badge as they often include history, geology, biology, reading comprehension, physical activity (hiking) and problem solving. Plus, we are usually outside exploring and getting my kids outside for school is always a plus!

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As an incentive, and encouragement to keep going we gave the kids each a $5 bill upon earning their 75th badge. This went over super well (I think its the most money they’ve ever physically had at one time), and the kids are still contemplating what they will be spending it on.

“How about we get $10 once we reach 150 badges?” they suggested.

I’m not sure we’ll raise the stakes that high, but I think $5 every 75 badges could go a long way to keeping them motivated!

75 National Park Junior Ranger Badges!

Categories
Michigan

Michigan Upper Peninsula Pasty (PAST-EE) Taste Test

Traveling through the Upper Peninsula of Michigan without trying a pasty would have been a travesty. A pasty is a baked pastry, traditionally filled with meat, vegetables, rutabagas, seasoning and then baked to perfection. It is pronounced Past-Tee, but more run together, like Past-ee. Mispronounce it and you will be gently corrected. It has a crimped, curved edge which allows a person to eat it with one hand. And they are only commonly found in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.

The pasty came over from Cornwall, England with the influx of immigrants who worked in the mines. The pasty was easy to stuff in a pocket or lunch pail, reheat over a lantern down in the mines, and then eat one handed.

Different shops have a variety of fillings now – from the traditional beef and potatoes, to chicken & broccoli, and even fruit (although we were told a dessert filled pasty is, in fact, not really a pasty).

We had a few recommendations for places to try that we decided to do a little taste test and see which of the three restaurants was our favorite.

Muldoon’s Pasties & Gifts – Munising, MI

First stop, and we didn’t really know what to expect, but the line was long which typically indicates good food. We asked for ours to stay, and they gave us paper plates and silverware to go with our wrapped pasties. We ordered a chicken, a beef, an apple, and a raspberry pasty. Cara didn’t eat a whole lot (or really anything at all), so we basically split each pasty between two people. It was a good amount of food and they were delicious! Half of us liked the chicken better, and the other half preferred the beef. Both were great with gravy.

Their desert pasties were my personal favorite. Officially a pasty or not, they tasted like pie and were even better with ice cream! This was the only one of the three that served dessert so I’m glad we went back a second time for round two.

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The raspberry pasty of awesomeness:

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Jean-Kay’s Pasties & Subs – Marquette, MI

We stopped by Jean-Kay’s for lunch on our way out of town. We were greeted warmly by the owner who took our order. Real plates and silverware with pasties straight from the warming oven. Jean-Kay’s crust was the lightest and probably best we tasted. We ordered a traditional beef and then a vegetable pasty which had cream cheese in it. I must be partial to cheese because that was my favorite part – although it seemed to be clumped near the top and would have been better melted throughout the whole pasty.

Jean-Kay’s pasties seemed a bit smaller so we ordered a small potato salad (which was amazing) and cookies to go!

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Roy’s Pasties & Bakery – Houghton, WI

This was definitely the most “commercialized” establishment of the three. Roy’s is located along the waterfront in Houghton and is a beautiful building with large windows and views of the lift bridge and river (canal?). They also have a more varied menu. Unfortunately, they were out of their Turkey Cranberry pasties (which sounded amazing), but we ordered a traditional, a chicken & broccoli, and two breakfast pasties (eggs, potatoes, sausage, cheese, & onion). Since Cara was not looking forward to yet another pasty dinner, we thought the breakfast one would go over better with her. It did, but she still didn’t eat much. Silly girl.

This was the first pasty that didn’t come with gravy, but we found some hot sauce packets that looked like a good deal and tried that. Pretty good! The traditional pasty was decent, but the chicken and broccoli was amazing!! I think it maybe have been the addition of cheese, but we almost had to play rock, paper, scissors to see who got to finish that one off.

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Apparently breakfast pasties call for a little ketchup!
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And the Winner Is…

Choosing a winner is difficult when they are so unique despite their common heritage. The ultimate winners here are the participants! We loved seeking out a locally unique food and testing a variety. Now, we only tried three pasty places, and we were assured that at least two other places were better than the ones we tried. Alas, both our stomachs and our pocketbooks couldn’t hold out to try them all!

Categories
Michigan WanderLog

Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (aka The UP)

Our Travel Log for Michigan

Travel Dates: August 7-17, 2015

We left the Dells, and arrived in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula unceremoniously on Friday afternoon, August 14, 2015 after driving up from Walmart down near Green Bay, Wisconsin. Totally ignored the time zone change to Eastern Time as we searched along the west shore of Lake Michigan for a place to stay for the weekend.

We finally ended up in Pioneer Trail County Park in Gladstone and snagged a rustic camping spot for the weekend. Played some disc golf, got laundry done, went grocery shopping, and made it to church.

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Bright and early Monday morning we headed farther to Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. We stopped at Muldoon’s Pasties & Gifts in Munising on the way up for lunch and thoroughly enjoyed our first pasty. Delicious, especially the dessert pies.

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Found a beautiful boondocking spot south of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore and spent a few, slightly frustrating days exploring the park with all the tourists on vacation.

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Headed back west, we spent two nights at Marquette Tourist County Park. The town is super cute & Sam and I managed to squeeze in a bike date to get ice cream at Frosty Treats. We also rode out to Presque Isle with the kids and hiked a bit around the peninsula/island. Super pretty. On our way out we ate at Jean -Kay’s pasties & subs and enjoyed our first vegetarian pasty.

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Drove to the Keweenaw Peninsula where we had reservations at Linden County Park so we could send packages ahead of us. The park isn’t amazing, but the kids enjoyed the swim beach.

11261374_860672233968730_479493537_nWe day tripped up to Calumet and the Keweenaw National Historic Site Visitor Center to earn our 74th Jr. Ranger Badge and enjoyed learning about the history of the area.

Our third and final pasty taste test was at Roy’s where their chicken & broccoli pastie totally took the gold medal. We also ventured into Hungarian Falls and were disappointed the reports of swimming in the waterfalls proved to be false, but had fun throwing rocks into the pool and hunting for frogs.

Moving farther west, our next stop was the Porcupine Mountains. We woke up super early to try and get to the Union Bay Campground for a first come, first served spot. Unfortunately, there was no Verizon signal anywhere and we weren’t very impressed with the campground anyway.

Instead, we decided to have Sam take the day off and we went hiking! After a quick lunch in the Visitor Center parking lot, we drove up to Summit Peak and hiked the loop ending with the lookout tower.  It was beautiful and only about 5.5 miles of pretty gentle grade. We loved it.

11326513_1517456441878056_1670842139_nIt was still only about 3:30pm so we drove over to the Lake of the Clouds overlook to check that out. Super pretty views, but all I could think about was the hike along the ridge that would be EPIC. So many back country trails and campsites at this park.

Lastly, we grabbed this pull out spot next to the side of the road and the kids played on the beach while Sam and I cooked up a grilled sausage and pasta dinner. Afterwards we had our weekly Family Night on the beach, followed by treats and then about an hour to Walmart in Ironwood, MI for the night.

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That wraps up (for now) our tour of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. It really is a different place than “the mitten” with absolutely gorgeous views of Lake Superior, and more back country hiking than I expected (not that my expectations were high to begin with!).

Next up we went back to Wisconsin to backpack on the Apostle Islands!

Categories
Minnesota

The 2nd Annual Midwest Corn Alps Paragliding Competition – Cosmos, MN

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We recently had the opportunity to attend the 2nd Annual Midwest Corn Alps Paragliding Competition out in Cosmos, MN. Last time we rolled through Minnesota Anna from SDI Paragliding reached out and said she’d love to meet up if we ever came through again. She’s a total travel lover and someday would love to set out with her family so naturally she follows many full time families on Instagram. This time around we spent a good 2-3 weeks trying to coordinate a time to get in some flying lessons or a tandem flight. Something always came up, but I swore we would make it work!

Well, we took long enough that eventually Anna tentatively invited us out to the competition they were having the following week and it lined up perfectly with our exodus from Minneapolis. Sold. They even had a base camp set up on one of the flier’s farms and we could bring the Airstream and camp next to a barn. Awesome.

The evening we got there, some of the pilots went out for an evening flight and we were able to tag along and watch them go up.

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Because there are no hills or mountains in Minnesota, the pilots are attached to a winch on a truck and then pulled up into the air. Its pretty fascinating! Anna’s father, Steve, has also designed a pretty spectacular winch and sells them as part of their business.

The group of participants – a good looking bunch!

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Anna and her family (she’s in orange):

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Each morning around 10-11am they would have a pilots meeting and discuss the challenge for the day. There was a whole lot of talk about wind speeds, distances and a lot of numbers on a white board that I didn’t understand but everyone else nodded and put the correct info into their flight computers.

After that we all caravanned out to the long, empty farm roads and one by one, the pilots were pulled into the air. Once the pilots had released the cable (or pinned out) the truck would swing around and come back for another pilot.

The day we watched was super hot and humid, but the kids were troopers! Sam even got to tag along in the truck with Steve as he pulled a pilot up into the air.
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After a quick trip into Hutchinson after lunch for some frozen yogurt and air conditioning at the local library, we headed back to base camp and got set up for a tandem flight for Sam and I. One of the groups participating in the event was ChicagoParagliding and they offered to help get us up into the air.

On a tandem flight we were strapped to an experienced pilot who did all the work of flying, all we had to do was run until we achieved lift off. I wasn’t so good at running and actually had to try twice to get up – eating dirt the first time as we crashed landed back to the ground.

It was pretty amazing (and slightly terrifying) to be up that high! Soaring up above all the farmlands was fairly surreal and since my pilot, Emmanuel, did all the work, I could just sit back and enjoy. The best way I can describe the view is its like looking out an airplane window on take off, but no airplane.

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I loved watching the passion these guys have for paragliding. Talking to Anna was so much fun because I could tell she really loves what her family does and enjoys sharing that passion with others. It was also amazing to watch this community of para-gliders interact with each other. There was so much camaraderie and fun even in the midst of a competition. Reminded me a bit of our traveling community and how much I love it.

We definitely had a great time, and loved making some new friends in the process. If you are ever near Minneapolis and are looking for something awesome – hit up SDI paragliding for some lessons. You seriously won’t be disappointed!

2nd Annual Midwest Corn Alps XC Competition in Cosmos MN. Sam and I even got up for a tandem flight!