Second Trip to Presque Isle

7/10 Tuesday
Joan and I left St Louis on Tuesday morning. All gear loaded and trailer hooked up the night before. We were making our second trip to the area to meet some buddies to do some 200 ft. Trimix diving in Thunderbay, Presque Isle. If you think automotive gas is expensive; interesting challenge getting ready this year was my initial ‘gas’ supply for my tanks. The diving requires a breathing mixture called Trimix that contains a blend of Oxygen, Helium and Nitrogen. It turns out that there is a bit of a He shortage, so not only is it hard to get, it is more expensive. To fill my back gas doubles with 18/45 (18% Oxygen and 45% Helium), and to top up a 50% (O2) stage from half to full cost me $185 and I had to jump thru hoops to get it done. (My breathing gas would be $563 this trip.)
This year we decided to drive straight through instead of stopping along the way for a night. It is a 12 hour drive time to Alpena, MI. So, it was about 14 hours total to handle gas and eating on the way.
We stayed at the same campground as the second part of our trip two years ago, Long Lake Campground (Alpena County park.) We got set up on our lake front site after thinking someone was in the one we were supposed to be, but it turned out we didn’t understand the layout. It seemed like we were going to be kind of crowded on an awkward site, but it turned out that it was a good site with plenty of shade, a good view and great neighbors. In fact, the layout of the site put the water and electric hookups kind of far from my connections. My electric wouldn’t reach and Frank (neighbor) lent us a heavy extension. (We later picked one up at an RV place.) Frank/Pauline and his immediate and extended family were wonderful to camp with. They shared their campfire, invited us to dinner and accepted us into their clan. I was able to share a cigar and bourbon and we had some smoked fish to offer. Their 8-yr old daughter, Lauren, sort of adopted me and regaled me with considerable conversation.

7/11 Wednesday
We traveled through so we would have a day to relax before the diving started. After breakfast, we drove into Alpena and explored a few of the parks and beach access points. Joan had plans to do some bike riding while the boat was out for diving. It turns out that the summer was warmer than usual on Lake Huron, too. Not in the 100’s, but it was upper 80’s and kind of humid.
We were kind of perplexed that we couldn’t find a place to sit out for a beer and sandwich on the water around the lake or the river! (Maybe a retirement plan will be to go up there and open up a summer business.) We eventually gave up after asking and a visit to the commerce chamber center. We decided to head back to camp and enjoy our lake view for a late lunch and I got my gear all put together for the next morning.

7/12 Thursday thru 7/15 Sunday
I dove with Shipwreck Adventurers (Greg Such) and a group of buddies out of Wisconsin. The diving was fantastic and the weather was very cooperative which can’t be counted on. While I dove, Joan made use of her new folding bike and she rode several of the local bike paths and around the area near the harbor. She also did a little local shopping.

7/16 Monday
We broke camp and departed around 10:00 am in sprinkles. We drove thru Indianapolis area stopping at Joan’s sister, Donna, and brother-in-law, Jim, to see their new house, which is fabulous, and spend the night. Dry roads all the way home and missed heavy traffic in all the towns. The final run into St Louis on Tuesday was easy, but boy was it hot when we got back at two in the afternoon. It was 102°!
In general the weather was real warm and muggy. Not as hot as StL, but warm for that area. In the past, we got cold in Kenosha and Two Rivers, WI. We took too many long sleeves and not enough light stuff again!
Our grand total mileage for our MI loop was 1,860 miles. We drove up thru the Chicago/Gary area and returned thru Flint/Lansing/Indianapolis.