Staying Flexible & Planting Roots
Another week that's gone by like that Mazda commercial..."zoom, zoom, zoom"...... I had plans to write up my usual Sunday night blog entry, but by the time I'd prepared the pics for it my eyes had fallen closed and I napped until about 2am in my chair. So....Here we are, a day late and probably a dollar short to boot.
It was a busy weekend. Friday afternoon right after work we took a ride up towards Ravenna to check out a house for sale that sounded real good. It was a ways outside the range of practicality, but still worth a look, we thought......but as we pulled up to the address our faces fell and our hopes got taken down another notch. This $170,000 house, on 4 acres, was directly across the street from what could only be described as the neighborhood junkyard. Cars were scattered over the length and breadth of the property and the abode itself looked to have been put together with soggy pieces of plywood. As if that wasn't enough to stiffle our interest, directly behind this house was a gravel pit that looked to be owned by the folks who owned the house! Now I've got nothing against entrepreneurial enterprise, but I'll be damned if I'm gonna buy a house so I can dig up the backyard and sell it off by the truckload. Obviously the person who wrote up the listing for this house didn't subscribe to the "truth in advertising" tenet. For a moment I considered sending the schmuck a bill for the fuel it took to make the drive, but instead we headed for Spring Lake and Vic's for a steak dinner.
Saturday morning we were up early to head up to Whiskey Creek for our planned tour of the campground and the search for a site that appealed to us as a place we'd like to spend frequent weekends for years to come. We arrived there around 10:00am and after a stop at the lodge to see if Mr Todd might happen to be there (nope) we started at the West end of the campground and rolled slowly down the dirt roads, surveying available sites as we went, taking down lot numbers of those which we felt had potential. After several hours of effort we came upon a corner of the campground that immediately appealed to Wanda.
Lot 246, at the corner of Meadow View Trail & Outer Loop Drive had obvious potential that we both saw immediately. We parked the car and started hiking around the site on foot. Within a couple minutes we'd found the perfect spot to plunk down a camper until some day in the future when we'd be in a position to upgrade the living quarters and I'd finally get to build that log cabin that has been hanging out in the back of my mind for years. We went back to the car and got out the maps of the area and were discuss
ing things when a big Dodge pickup came down the trail, driven by an older gentleman by the name of Clyde who stopped to say hi. After chatting for a couple minutes with Clyde and explaining that we were interested in lots 245 & 246 but weren't sure where one ended and the other began, he volunteered to go back to his place, grab his tape measure and by using the map coordinates, figure out just where the property lines were located. Turns out that Clyde was a county assessor before he retired and moved to Whisky Creek to live there year round, so tromping thru the woods with a tape measure was a natural thing for him to do.
Not long after Clyde came back with his tape, another older gentleman by the name of Corky stopped by to say howdy and find out who we were and what was going on. So, the 4 of us for the next hour or so hiked up and down the gradual grade of the two lots until we had surveyed it all and gotten a fairly good idea where the lines were drawn. At that point Corky said goodbye and headed back to his homestead. Clyde also headed for his vehicle. We decided then that it was time to go visit the gentleman I'd talked to earlier in the week about a camper he was selling. We found his campsite without much trouble, just down the road and around the corner from where we'd just been. We took the 25 cent tour of the trailer and then spent the next half hour trying to remove ourselves gracefully from someone who had the gift of gab.......The trailer was ok but we're going to continue to shop around for awhile.
From the trailer inspection we headed over to the Fett's lot and stopped in for a visit. We ended up getting a guided tour of the entire campground via a cruise on their golf cart. They showed us a number of places that were available by realtor (grrr) or owner that had campers and hookups already available. By the time we got back to their campsite it was late in the afternoon so we thanked them for the tour and headed for home.
Sunday was Easter so a trip to the folks place was in order. The weather wasn't good enough to risk taking the motorcycle so myself, Chris, Ri and Adam all piled in the van and headed for big Rapids. Between the time we arrived at 11:30am and 5:00pm when we headed for home I spent most of the time talking to my dad about campsites, jobs, kids and other stuff while Adam and Ri gave mom computer lessons. Before dinner A
dam, Chris and me took a hike out behind the house and discovered a deer skeleton. Chris took the mostly intact jawbone and brought it home with the intention of giving it to the science teacher, Mr Whipkey. We had a good Easter dinner of ham, sweet potatos and fixin's and after dinner I took a short hike around the pond and shot some reflective pics.
We got back home about 7 and I wrapped up the day by giving both Bailey and Mercury baths. By the time I'd gotten them washed, dryed and brushed out Wanda was home from Bingo and the weekend was pretty much over.
I'd like to elaborate on the campsite venture but it's late and tomorrow is gonna be a big, busy day with a trip to South Bend In. so I'm heading for bed now and we'll talk more about Whiskey Creek and the master plan later on.
TC
It was a busy weekend. Friday afternoon right after work we took a ride up towards Ravenna to check out a house for sale that sounded real good. It was a ways outside the range of practicality, but still worth a look, we thought......but as we pulled up to the address our faces fell and our hopes got taken down another notch. This $170,000 house, on 4 acres, was directly across the street from what could only be described as the neighborhood junkyard. Cars were scattered over the length and breadth of the property and the abode itself looked to have been put together with soggy pieces of plywood. As if that wasn't enough to stiffle our interest, directly behind this house was a gravel pit that looked to be owned by the folks who owned the house! Now I've got nothing against entrepreneurial enterprise, but I'll be damned if I'm gonna buy a house so I can dig up the backyard and sell it off by the truckload. Obviously the person who wrote up the listing for this house didn't subscribe to the "truth in advertising" tenet. For a moment I considered sending the schmuck a bill for the fuel it took to make the drive, but instead we headed for Spring Lake and Vic's for a steak dinner.
Saturday morning we were up early to head up to Whiskey Creek for our planned tour of the campground and the search for a site that appealed to us as a place we'd like to spend frequent weekends for years to come. We arrived there around 10:00am and after a stop at the lodge to see if Mr Todd might happen to be there (nope) we started at the West end of the campground and rolled slowly down the dirt roads, surveying available sites as we went, taking down lot numbers of those which we felt had potential. After several hours of effort we came upon a corner of the campground that immediately appealed to Wanda.
Lot 246, at the corner of Meadow View Trail & Outer Loop Drive had obvious potential that we both saw immediately. We parked the car and started hiking around the site on foot. Within a couple minutes we'd found the perfect spot to plunk down a camper until some day in the future when we'd be in a position to upgrade the living quarters and I'd finally get to build that log cabin that has been hanging out in the back of my mind for years. We went back to the car and got out the maps of the area and were discuss
ing things when a big Dodge pickup came down the trail, driven by an older gentleman by the name of Clyde who stopped to say hi. After chatting for a couple minutes with Clyde and explaining that we were interested in lots 245 & 246 but weren't sure where one ended and the other began, he volunteered to go back to his place, grab his tape measure and by using the map coordinates, figure out just where the property lines were located. Turns out that Clyde was a county assessor before he retired and moved to Whisky Creek to live there year round, so tromping thru the woods with a tape measure was a natural thing for him to do. Not long after Clyde came back with his tape, another older gentleman by the name of Corky stopped by to say howdy and find out who we were and what was going on. So, the 4 of us for the next hour or so hiked up and down the gradual grade of the two lots until we had surveyed it all and gotten a fairly good idea where the lines were drawn. At that point Corky said goodbye and headed back to his homestead. Clyde also headed for his vehicle. We decided then that it was time to go visit the gentleman I'd talked to earlier in the week about a camper he was selling. We found his campsite without much trouble, just down the road and around the corner from where we'd just been. We took the 25 cent tour of the trailer and then spent the next half hour trying to remove ourselves gracefully from someone who had the gift of gab.......The trailer was ok but we're going to continue to shop around for awhile.
From the trailer inspection we headed over to the Fett's lot and stopped in for a visit. We ended up getting a guided tour of the entire campground via a cruise on their golf cart. They showed us a number of places that were available by realtor (grrr) or owner that had campers and hookups already available. By the time we got back to their campsite it was late in the afternoon so we thanked them for the tour and headed for home.
Sunday was Easter so a trip to the folks place was in order. The weather wasn't good enough to risk taking the motorcycle so myself, Chris, Ri and Adam all piled in the van and headed for big Rapids. Between the time we arrived at 11:30am and 5:00pm when we headed for home I spent most of the time talking to my dad about campsites, jobs, kids and other stuff while Adam and Ri gave mom computer lessons. Before dinner A
dam, Chris and me took a hike out behind the house and discovered a deer skeleton. Chris took the mostly intact jawbone and brought it home with the intention of giving it to the science teacher, Mr Whipkey. We had a good Easter dinner of ham, sweet potatos and fixin's and after dinner I took a short hike around the pond and shot some reflective pics. We got back home about 7 and I wrapped up the day by giving both Bailey and Mercury baths. By the time I'd gotten them washed, dryed and brushed out Wanda was home from Bingo and the weekend was pretty much over.
I'd like to elaborate on the campsite venture but it's late and tomorrow is gonna be a big, busy day with a trip to South Bend In. so I'm heading for bed now and we'll talk more about Whiskey Creek and the master plan later on.
TC
posted by Tom Eckels at 11:49 PM
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