Off Like a Herd of Turtles: Family Travel Blog

  The second stop on our "National Parks of Michigan" tour was Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. We stayed at the Bay Furnace campground that was part of Hiawatha National Forest. We tried all the usual recreation.gov tricks but were still unable to get a campsite at the desired Twelvemile Beach or Hurricane River campgrounds. However, not to worry if you are in the same situation. Pictured Rocks is surrounded by state and federal land- Hiawatha National Forest and Lake Super State Forest surround the little national lakeshore so you can utilize the campsites there instead. Bay Furnace was just west of the park past Munising- the farthest eastern end of the park was about an hour away. The campground was nice with large wooded sites, some on the water. Very good place to stay. Here are the things we did as well as some recommendations if you have more time.  Camp chores 1. Paddling Pictured Rocks The plan was to take a boat out a few miles to the heart of Pictured rocks- to ...

I'm grateful to have been many places and on many adventures in my 40 something years but this one? This one knocked it out of the park. Zooey (8) and I went on a 4 night, 5 day whitewater rafting Mommy/Daughter adventure with Western River Expeditions ( Action Whitewater Adventures led the whitewater rafting trip). This trip represented a ton of firsts for us : our first post COVID flights, our first long trip away from Oliver (3), our first multi-day wilderness expedition, our first whitewater rafting. And I'll admit for a few minutes during the foggy morning ride on the small plane that brought us from Boise to the tiny town of Salmon, Idaho there was a second where I wondered "did I make a mistake?". But I did not. In fact, I made an excellent excellent choice:) Z was SO excited to be on a plane again! There were many things that made this trip wonderful - the rafting, the time with Z, the amazing beauty surrounding us, the being 100% outside for 5 days straight ...