October 5 - Drive to Door County, Wisconsin

Since it was time to shift our location, we saddled up the trailer and set out for Door County, Wisconsin, shortly after 9. First, though, we had to pass the final test of using an RV, emptying the waste water tanks. Like most RVs, our trailer had a “black water” tank for the sewage and a “gray water” tank for the drain water from the sinks and shower. The trick, we were told, was to have enough water in the black water tank for it all to drain successfully—if you think about it ever so briefly you will no doubt agree that having incompletely drained sewage might become quite disagreeable quite quickly.

So the recommended drill was to add enough water to the black water tank for it to get fairly full, then drain it at the dump station and follow up with draining the gray water tank to flush that all through and finally rinse with some nice clean water. We successfully completed all steps except the very last because the park had turned off the faucet for the rinse water due to the temperatures in the 20s we had a couple nights back. Still, the connector hose was pretty well rinsed by the gray water, so we recapped our trailer’s drainpipe and were on the road at last shortly before 10 a.m.

We drove slowly northeast for the next five hours, stopping only for lunch near Oshkosh when we found another Culver’s restaurant. This time we tried their Philly Cheesesteak sandwiches. Instead of the normal thin slices of beef, these sandwiches had ¼” thick slabs of juicy beef topped with a layer of onions and Swiss cheese. The French Fries were once again hot, crisp, and tasty just like last time, and the hot fudge Sundae we had for dessert again featured their firm frozen custard covered with a generous layer of hot chocolate fudge topping, and it all cost less than $15. If we get one more great meal entrée and another wonderful dessert at a Culver’s we’re going to become great fans of this chain—a shame they are not out east as far as I know.

The drive from the city of Green Bay up the peninsula between Green Bay and Lake Michigan finally narrowed to a 2-lane road. I tended to back up traffic driving 55 mph, so I pulled off now and then to let the line of traffic pass me. The German’s call this line of traffic behind a slow lead car a “schlange”, which is German for “snake”. As usual, the Germans have a rather biting joke about this situation that goes something like the following: “What’s the difference between a real snake and a traffic snake? Answer: With the real snake the ass is at the rear end.” Not wanting to be considered a snake’s derriere, I pulled off whenever I could find a paved shoulder.

Arriving at Potawatomi State Park shortly after 3, we filled up the fresh water tank and proceeded to our campsite, where I surprised everyone including myself by backing the trailer into our space on the first try—beginner’s luck? After getting it level and disconnecting everything we gathered some firewood and took a walk to an observation tower a couple of kilometers away to watch the sunset. The tower was tall and swayed rather more than I liked, but we did get a magnificent view of the Green Bay side of the peninsula.

But we could really feel the wind up there and the temperature was dropping rapidly as the sun set, so we hustled back to the trailer for a warm meal. After dinner I worked on the trip journal while Monika played the dulcimer—we weren’t able to find radio stations that offered anything other than country or gospel music, so making our own seemed preferable.