Sleeping on the Beach at Portage Bay

My birthday fell on a Saturday this year. Erin and I did our yearly trip the the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to go camping. We go here so that her parents can watch Arthur, and so we cannot usually go to far from here. In years past we had gone to Sylvania or Munising, but this year we headed back to the same place we went last year, Portage Bay State Forest, just because it is so remote and quiet. On Friday, because we left after work, we got up to her parents late, so we decided to stay at Indian Lake State Park. The campsites at Portage Bay are first come, first served, so we didn’t want to risk that since it takes a couple hours just to get out there. On Friday we just had a campfire and talked then went to bed. We woke up early, got groceries in Manistique, and then went to stake out a campsite at Portage Bay. When we first got there, the site we had last year, the one at the very end, was taken. So we drove down the path to see that most all the other sites were taken. When we got to #17 it was open, and it was the best one of them all. You could not see any of your neighbors so it was like we had our own private beach. We set up camp and the drove back out to go to the Indian Lake pathway trail, a 4.5 mile loop. We did that, and drove back to our campsite to spend time at the beach. We made a campfire and made potatos and onions, drank some beer and just talked. We slept on the beach that night. It was wonderful to see all the stars. and the crescent moon rise, then later the sun rise. On Sunday we packed up and got some diner breakfast to go, then back to Powers for the La Bonte family cornroast. Arthur and his grandparents were already there, and Arthur was playing with some of his cousins, which was nice to see. We drove back to Erin’s parents and watched a movie. It was a good birthday weekend.