2020 09 22 - State Park, William O'Brien

Today we stuck to the roads, flat surfaces, mostly paved, no hills.

Our plan had been to work today, but no work, so we just went to one of our closest parks for a short walk.

We have now been to 5 of the 6 state parks within 50 miles of us. And these are the ones we are most likely to keep coming back to for short walks. An hour drive, an hour walk, and another hour drive.

My wife just had surgery 10 days ago and now has decided that pushing ourselves on walks last weekend was likely overdoing it. No issues, but also no reason to push. I think the bigger reason was al of the roots on the trail last weekend. Always looking down instead of just enjoying the day.

Instead of parking in the main parking areas, we parked at the 'guest parking' near the campground. The drives are all paved and very little traffic this time of the year on a weekday.

Another reason for walking the campground is my wife likes to imagine that we are camping. She is not as excited to actually do it. We used to do it a lot at the KOA's when our kids were young. And more recently she had 'converted' our van to a sleeper van. She had put a mattress in the van, plus shades. We used it on one trip to Canada and I wasn't real thrilled about it so she dropped it. Now 10 years later, I am hearing how disappointed she is that we didn't keep using it.

Today, we walk through each loop of the campgrounds and then down the road to the 'cart-in' camping area. Just about 45 minutes. There is also a paved bike trail across the front of the park along the highway that is level. And we have walked some of the dirt paths that are level, but this park has a lot of hills too.

We did see some fence at this park. I think it is to get the brush to start growing between the camping spots. I also saw some at the backs of camping spots where I'm guessing people were making short cuts to other paths or the toilets.

For the thousands of campers and RV's that are produced every year, we do not see much at the campgrounds of 'new.' Most of the units here are well used for years and years.

Today we did not drive through the rest of the park, we'll be here often enough.

No other stops today.

The other thing I am trying to do besides walking is to just be outside for at least another hour every day besides the walk. Easy if you are a farm kid, but not as easy if you live in a little apartment or a small lot. We have a smaller lot but enough room for a garden.

No gardening today, but we did get a bonfire going for a few hours. Another way to imagine we are camping. Clear night, no wind.