The Week of 1000 Miles: Fin
Saturday, May 26th: to Big Knob
For the past 12 years a group of my friends have been camping together every Memorial Day weekend at a secluded campground in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. At its genesis, as I am told, it camping trip was a way for underage friends from Wisconsin and Michigan to convene at a midpoint destination and have a party. In the intervening years it has evolved in many ways and has seen a bachelor party, the ebb and flow of attendees, brothers and sisters, boyfriends and girlfriends, warm weather, freezing weather, sun and rain, late, late nights and sunrises, a ton of drinking, the odd hook-up, visitors near and far, marriages and now children. I have attended twice and this year, after a few years’ hiatus, returned for my third visit.
Big Knob campground is situated on the northern shore of Lake Michigan six miles down a winding gravel road off of U.S. Highway 2, west of bustling Naubinway. The entrance to the campground is so well marked that those who blink at the imprecise moment will miss the turn. This is not all bad, as its seclusion pretty much guarantees the campground is completely empty when we descend on it in mass every year. A little internet research yields that Big Knob gets its name from what amounts to a dune hill that rises a whopping 140 feet above the surrounding terra firma. I have yet to lay eyes on this Rock of Gibraltar, but the DNR claims it exists.
I have camped in a lot of places in my life starting in the backyard as a child and progressing through various stages of rustic to plush accommodations. As I got older many family vacations took the form of camping trips as we paraded around the state, first with tents, and then in the minivan towing a pop-up camper trailer. Both of my parents in their youth vacationed with their respective families on numerous camping vacations. My mother’s family undertaking a well-documented 3-week trip to the American West when she was a teenager and my dad’s parents driving he and his brothers to places like Gettysburg; quintessential American vacations of the 50s and 60s. The farthest my parents took me and my sister was a two-week trip to Gettysburg, Washington D.C., and into the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. Aside from that most of our family camping experiences took place in any number of state park campgrounds in and about northern Michigan. Once I started college I met a group of friends that shared a love a travel and so, in varying groups and numbers, I’ve camped in several places in the western U.S. and Canada. These trips were undertaken with a greater sense of seeking adventure and bare-bones subsistence than compared to parking the pop-up on a campsite for three days and roasting marshmallows every night around the campfire. The pinnacle being backcountry hiking and camping in Denali National Park in Alaska: no manicured campsites, nary a trail, navigating by topographic map, fording rivers, filtering water from mountain streams, keeping an eye out for the odd Grizzly bear or irritated moose, and being bombarded by billions (yes, billions) of hellacious mosquitoes. Big Knob, despite its secluded location, lack of electricity, and pit toilets, is not rustic camping. This is fine because Big Knob weekend isn’t about adventure, it’s about camaraderie.
Camping in many ways is an ironic undertaking. In an effort to live minimally in harmony with the natural surroundings, we pack mountains of equipment that would be completely unnecessary were we to spend the weekend at a friend’s house or at a hotel. Packing for Big Knob is no different. In its twelve years, the core nucleus attendees to Big Knob have become a well-oiled machine in regards to knowing exactly what and how much to bring of everything. Those of us on the fringes are responsible for providing our own accommodations, creature comforts and bare necessities, but food, drink, and mess supplies are provided, plentiful and perfectly in order. It still amounts to a pile of gear though, especially now that children have been thrown into the mix. In my previous life as a traveler I often packed light and my general rule of thumb was “one bag,” regardless of the trip duration. Going to be gone more than a week? Depending on the climate of my intended destination I’d pack sufficient underwear and socks, but probably only one or two pairs of pants and only a few shirts of flexible utility. The less that gets packed, the less there is to carry, as well as get checked onto planes, or lost by baggage handlers. Of course this plan wasn’t totally foolproof as I once boarded an eight passenger plane, its flight plan taking me from San Juan, Puerto Rico to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, landing twenty-five minutes after taking off; only to find after arriving in St. Thomas that my bag—one of ten bags to be loaded on the plane by the ground crew in San Juan—didn’t come through on the conveyor belt where I awaited it at baggage claim. Absurdly, the only time I have ever lost a bag.
In the three years since my injury, my travel exploits basically came to an abrupt halt. Health, money, stamina, issues of personal care and independence were all contributing factors in how far and how long I ventured from home. Gone are the days of packing a bag in an hour, grabbing some CDs, hopping in the car and dropping in on friends ten or twelve hours later in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Minneapolis, or wherever during summer vacation. Traveling wheelchair-bound puts a pretty big crimp in the assault-style method of travel I used to enjoy. There are so many other aspects and complications besides just packing for a two night trip to consider now. My biggest concerns in deciding to return to Big Knob this year were the weather, sleeping comfortably, and my wheelchair in Big Knob’s wheelchair-hostile terrain.
The weather at Big Knob is highly unpredictable from year-to-year and the best bet is to prepare for the worst and then hopefully be pleasantly surprised. I prepared for cold, which for me anticipating being outside all day, was basically anything less than 60°. I have poor circulation and terrible body temperature regulation so it doesn’t take much for me to catch a chill. In anticipation of nighttime temperatures forecasted to drop into the 40 degree realm I brought thermal undershirts, a hooded sweatshirt, a fleece jacket, a knit hat and mittens. When I arrived Saturday evening it had been sunny and 70° during the day, but as I got help unloading my gear the clouds had rolled in and rain drops began sprinkling down. From about 8pm Saturday night and onward a steady, light rain fell. I slept that night wearing everything I wore during the day, save for my shoes and the fleece jacket I put on upon arriving. The rain abated early Sunday morning and the day was cool, but dry. From the get-go on Sunday I layered in two undershirts, the hooded sweatshirt, fleece and knit hat. Staying warmer during the day and having the good fortune of being dry, I went to bed feeling much warmer than the previous night. True to form, Monday being the day in which we all had to pack up and leave, featured the best weather of the weekend: sunny and warm. Aside from Saturday night, I managed to stay fairly comfortable temperature-wise and with the ferocity of the mosquitoes this year I was glad I had plenty of long sleeves and a hat to stave off their ravenous swarms.
Tent camping doesn’t lend itself to the most comfortable sleeping arrangements. Roughing it in Alaska, where my friends and I were setting up camp with what we were able to carry on our backs, finding a completely flat place to set up a tent was pretty much pointless. Traveling light we didn’t have extras of blankets, sleeping bags, or fluffy pillows with which to cushion our sleeping space and so most nights we made due with trying to be as comfortable as possible on the uneven ground. Even at Big Knob I think the best I’ve previously done in terms of cushioning between my body and the ground was a second sleeping bag underneath the one in which I slept. As the Big Knob experience has expanded and people have gotten smart about what to bring, I’m pretty sure that this year everyone slept on some sort of air mattress. For me from the perspective of dealing with paralysis, the issue of what to sleep on had less to due directly with comfort as it had to do with preventing sores from sleeping in one position all night long on hard ground. My sleeping arrangements at home I have tailored in such a way that I am able to get in bed and move about at night without having to worry about sleeping in one position too long and risking a sore. Tent camping eliminates all of that convenience. Not only did I have to rely on my friends to get me out of my chair and into my tent, but they also had to get me in my sleeping bag, and then set up the implements I needed at night for being able to go to the bathroom. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to turn and reposition at night because I didn’t have anything to pull against, so before embarking on the trip I made a stop at my local camping store and purchased a self-inflating ground roll. At full capacity it expanded to 2½ inches and kept me off of the cold, hard ground. I made sure and bought the six-foot long pad so that my feet wouldn’t be resting on the ground either. On top of the ground roll I brought a thick blanket and a second sleeping bag to give me additional, softer layers to lie on top of in my down sleeping bag. Lying still on my back all night long wasn’t the greatest, but it was comfortable enough that once I warmed up inside my sleeping bag, I slept soundly. The ground roll and extra sleeping ended up being sufficient padding as I made it through the weekend without any bruising or skin breakdown. Aside from reconciling those comfort-related issues I brought with me a small, battery powered, reading light that I set by my head so that if I needed to see in the tent at night I had a light source available. I also made sure to attach a leather loop to the zipper of my sleeping bag before I left so I would be able to work the zipper when I needed to open up the bag at night to go to the bathroom. To top it all off, my friends brought an extra sleeping bag that they draped over top of me and that provided an extra layer of warmth that was especially welcomed on the first night. In the end though I think two nights of that was enough as I awoke on Monday morning feeling quite stiff.
The final piece of the puzzle was figuring what I was going to do with my wheelchair. I use a manual chair that has power-assist wheels. The wheels are powered by batteries that need to recharge after every day’s use. At home I accomplish by plugging into the charger at night while I sleep. Big Knob campground doesn’t have electrical hook-ups and so bringing my charger would be useless. The problem of my batteries running out of juice meant that once they were kaput I would need someone to push me around everywhere. Without the power assist function working the wheels, because of their design, become 50 pounds of dead weight. I packed my backup set of regular manual wheels thinking that once my power assist wheels quit we could switch to the manual wheels and, at the very least, my friends would be able to push me around in a much lighter chair. Then a couple days before I left I had the idea to charge up the second set of batteries I own for my power assist wheels and see how long they hold a charge without being used. Upon discovering that they still held a full charge overnight I decided to bring the second set of batteries along as well. Driving up on Saturday the power assist wheels on my chair sat turned off for six hours and so when I went to bed Saturday night the first set of batteries still held a decent partial charge. After I got into my tent, I had my chair stowed inside my van overnight. In the morning we swapped out the first set of batteries and I used the fully-charged second set during the day Sunday, thus after they crapped out Sunday evening I still had the first set holding a partial charge to use on the way home Monday. In the end I never used the manual wheels I brought, but they wouldn’t have done me much good anyway as the tires on those wheels are only a half an inch in width and would’ve sunk right down in the sandy soil of the campground. As it stood, even in my power assist wheels, which are pretty good at powering through grass and uneven terrain, the ground in certain spots around our campsites was so soft that the front casters on my wheelchair dug in and I needed to be pushed around anyway. I spent a great deal of time perched near the fire pit and occasionally got help to move to more desirable vantage points or to be closer to the thick of the action.
So, despite my initial concerns camping in Big Knob came off with few hiccups. Considering what I felt were going to be the biggest obstacles and the fact that the weather was less than stellar, I can only assume that future return trips will only get easier. That being said, I'm probably not going to throw camping into my regular rotation of weekend activities. Big Knob was successful for me because of the people that were there with me. Basically I have my friends to thank who catered to my every whim and fancy over the weekend. From pushing me around the campsite, fetching me food and drink, helping me dress, unpacking and then repacking my gear—none of it would have come off without their help. All I really did was show up.
Big Knob campground is situated on the northern shore of Lake Michigan six miles down a winding gravel road off of U.S. Highway 2, west of bustling Naubinway. The entrance to the campground is so well marked that those who blink at the imprecise moment will miss the turn. This is not all bad, as its seclusion pretty much guarantees the campground is completely empty when we descend on it in mass every year. A little internet research yields that Big Knob gets its name from what amounts to a dune hill that rises a whopping 140 feet above the surrounding terra firma. I have yet to lay eyes on this Rock of Gibraltar, but the DNR claims it exists.
I have camped in a lot of places in my life starting in the backyard as a child and progressing through various stages of rustic to plush accommodations. As I got older many family vacations took the form of camping trips as we paraded around the state, first with tents, and then in the minivan towing a pop-up camper trailer. Both of my parents in their youth vacationed with their respective families on numerous camping vacations. My mother’s family undertaking a well-documented 3-week trip to the American West when she was a teenager and my dad’s parents driving he and his brothers to places like Gettysburg; quintessential American vacations of the 50s and 60s. The farthest my parents took me and my sister was a two-week trip to Gettysburg, Washington D.C., and into the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. Aside from that most of our family camping experiences took place in any number of state park campgrounds in and about northern Michigan. Once I started college I met a group of friends that shared a love a travel and so, in varying groups and numbers, I’ve camped in several places in the western U.S. and Canada. These trips were undertaken with a greater sense of seeking adventure and bare-bones subsistence than compared to parking the pop-up on a campsite for three days and roasting marshmallows every night around the campfire. The pinnacle being backcountry hiking and camping in Denali National Park in Alaska: no manicured campsites, nary a trail, navigating by topographic map, fording rivers, filtering water from mountain streams, keeping an eye out for the odd Grizzly bear or irritated moose, and being bombarded by billions (yes, billions) of hellacious mosquitoes. Big Knob, despite its secluded location, lack of electricity, and pit toilets, is not rustic camping. This is fine because Big Knob weekend isn’t about adventure, it’s about camaraderie.
Camping in many ways is an ironic undertaking. In an effort to live minimally in harmony with the natural surroundings, we pack mountains of equipment that would be completely unnecessary were we to spend the weekend at a friend’s house or at a hotel. Packing for Big Knob is no different. In its twelve years, the core nucleus attendees to Big Knob have become a well-oiled machine in regards to knowing exactly what and how much to bring of everything. Those of us on the fringes are responsible for providing our own accommodations, creature comforts and bare necessities, but food, drink, and mess supplies are provided, plentiful and perfectly in order. It still amounts to a pile of gear though, especially now that children have been thrown into the mix. In my previous life as a traveler I often packed light and my general rule of thumb was “one bag,” regardless of the trip duration. Going to be gone more than a week? Depending on the climate of my intended destination I’d pack sufficient underwear and socks, but probably only one or two pairs of pants and only a few shirts of flexible utility. The less that gets packed, the less there is to carry, as well as get checked onto planes, or lost by baggage handlers. Of course this plan wasn’t totally foolproof as I once boarded an eight passenger plane, its flight plan taking me from San Juan, Puerto Rico to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, landing twenty-five minutes after taking off; only to find after arriving in St. Thomas that my bag—one of ten bags to be loaded on the plane by the ground crew in San Juan—didn’t come through on the conveyor belt where I awaited it at baggage claim. Absurdly, the only time I have ever lost a bag.
In the three years since my injury, my travel exploits basically came to an abrupt halt. Health, money, stamina, issues of personal care and independence were all contributing factors in how far and how long I ventured from home. Gone are the days of packing a bag in an hour, grabbing some CDs, hopping in the car and dropping in on friends ten or twelve hours later in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Minneapolis, or wherever during summer vacation. Traveling wheelchair-bound puts a pretty big crimp in the assault-style method of travel I used to enjoy. There are so many other aspects and complications besides just packing for a two night trip to consider now. My biggest concerns in deciding to return to Big Knob this year were the weather, sleeping comfortably, and my wheelchair in Big Knob’s wheelchair-hostile terrain.
The weather at Big Knob is highly unpredictable from year-to-year and the best bet is to prepare for the worst and then hopefully be pleasantly surprised. I prepared for cold, which for me anticipating being outside all day, was basically anything less than 60°. I have poor circulation and terrible body temperature regulation so it doesn’t take much for me to catch a chill. In anticipation of nighttime temperatures forecasted to drop into the 40 degree realm I brought thermal undershirts, a hooded sweatshirt, a fleece jacket, a knit hat and mittens. When I arrived Saturday evening it had been sunny and 70° during the day, but as I got help unloading my gear the clouds had rolled in and rain drops began sprinkling down. From about 8pm Saturday night and onward a steady, light rain fell. I slept that night wearing everything I wore during the day, save for my shoes and the fleece jacket I put on upon arriving. The rain abated early Sunday morning and the day was cool, but dry. From the get-go on Sunday I layered in two undershirts, the hooded sweatshirt, fleece and knit hat. Staying warmer during the day and having the good fortune of being dry, I went to bed feeling much warmer than the previous night. True to form, Monday being the day in which we all had to pack up and leave, featured the best weather of the weekend: sunny and warm. Aside from Saturday night, I managed to stay fairly comfortable temperature-wise and with the ferocity of the mosquitoes this year I was glad I had plenty of long sleeves and a hat to stave off their ravenous swarms.
Tent camping doesn’t lend itself to the most comfortable sleeping arrangements. Roughing it in Alaska, where my friends and I were setting up camp with what we were able to carry on our backs, finding a completely flat place to set up a tent was pretty much pointless. Traveling light we didn’t have extras of blankets, sleeping bags, or fluffy pillows with which to cushion our sleeping space and so most nights we made due with trying to be as comfortable as possible on the uneven ground. Even at Big Knob I think the best I’ve previously done in terms of cushioning between my body and the ground was a second sleeping bag underneath the one in which I slept. As the Big Knob experience has expanded and people have gotten smart about what to bring, I’m pretty sure that this year everyone slept on some sort of air mattress. For me from the perspective of dealing with paralysis, the issue of what to sleep on had less to due directly with comfort as it had to do with preventing sores from sleeping in one position all night long on hard ground. My sleeping arrangements at home I have tailored in such a way that I am able to get in bed and move about at night without having to worry about sleeping in one position too long and risking a sore. Tent camping eliminates all of that convenience. Not only did I have to rely on my friends to get me out of my chair and into my tent, but they also had to get me in my sleeping bag, and then set up the implements I needed at night for being able to go to the bathroom. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to turn and reposition at night because I didn’t have anything to pull against, so before embarking on the trip I made a stop at my local camping store and purchased a self-inflating ground roll. At full capacity it expanded to 2½ inches and kept me off of the cold, hard ground. I made sure and bought the six-foot long pad so that my feet wouldn’t be resting on the ground either. On top of the ground roll I brought a thick blanket and a second sleeping bag to give me additional, softer layers to lie on top of in my down sleeping bag. Lying still on my back all night long wasn’t the greatest, but it was comfortable enough that once I warmed up inside my sleeping bag, I slept soundly. The ground roll and extra sleeping ended up being sufficient padding as I made it through the weekend without any bruising or skin breakdown. Aside from reconciling those comfort-related issues I brought with me a small, battery powered, reading light that I set by my head so that if I needed to see in the tent at night I had a light source available. I also made sure to attach a leather loop to the zipper of my sleeping bag before I left so I would be able to work the zipper when I needed to open up the bag at night to go to the bathroom. To top it all off, my friends brought an extra sleeping bag that they draped over top of me and that provided an extra layer of warmth that was especially welcomed on the first night. In the end though I think two nights of that was enough as I awoke on Monday morning feeling quite stiff.
The final piece of the puzzle was figuring what I was going to do with my wheelchair. I use a manual chair that has power-assist wheels. The wheels are powered by batteries that need to recharge after every day’s use. At home I accomplish by plugging into the charger at night while I sleep. Big Knob campground doesn’t have electrical hook-ups and so bringing my charger would be useless. The problem of my batteries running out of juice meant that once they were kaput I would need someone to push me around everywhere. Without the power assist function working the wheels, because of their design, become 50 pounds of dead weight. I packed my backup set of regular manual wheels thinking that once my power assist wheels quit we could switch to the manual wheels and, at the very least, my friends would be able to push me around in a much lighter chair. Then a couple days before I left I had the idea to charge up the second set of batteries I own for my power assist wheels and see how long they hold a charge without being used. Upon discovering that they still held a full charge overnight I decided to bring the second set of batteries along as well. Driving up on Saturday the power assist wheels on my chair sat turned off for six hours and so when I went to bed Saturday night the first set of batteries still held a decent partial charge. After I got into my tent, I had my chair stowed inside my van overnight. In the morning we swapped out the first set of batteries and I used the fully-charged second set during the day Sunday, thus after they crapped out Sunday evening I still had the first set holding a partial charge to use on the way home Monday. In the end I never used the manual wheels I brought, but they wouldn’t have done me much good anyway as the tires on those wheels are only a half an inch in width and would’ve sunk right down in the sandy soil of the campground. As it stood, even in my power assist wheels, which are pretty good at powering through grass and uneven terrain, the ground in certain spots around our campsites was so soft that the front casters on my wheelchair dug in and I needed to be pushed around anyway. I spent a great deal of time perched near the fire pit and occasionally got help to move to more desirable vantage points or to be closer to the thick of the action.
So, despite my initial concerns camping in Big Knob came off with few hiccups. Considering what I felt were going to be the biggest obstacles and the fact that the weather was less than stellar, I can only assume that future return trips will only get easier. That being said, I'm probably not going to throw camping into my regular rotation of weekend activities. Big Knob was successful for me because of the people that were there with me. Basically I have my friends to thank who catered to my every whim and fancy over the weekend. From pushing me around the campsite, fetching me food and drink, helping me dress, unpacking and then repacking my gear—none of it would have come off without their help. All I really did was show up.
Round trip mileage: 699
Cumulative week's mileage: 1139
(does not include routine trips to Livonia on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)
