My annual camping trip to Peninsula State Park in Door County, Wisconsin for 2008 is now but a memory. My husband and I fell in love with the campground on our first trip there 7 years ago and has since become a campground we visit every year, usually in the fall.

But we may have to rethink when we take our annual trip there or stay in another campground in the park because our last 2 fall trips to Peninsula State Park have been very cold and windy.

The park has 5 campgrounds. We like to stay in the smallest one, Weborg, that has just 12 sites. We like it because it’s small and cozy, the bathroom and shower building is nice, there’s a great day use room that looks over the water, all the sites have electric hookups, there’s a pier for fishing or enjoying the view, and all the sites are right on the water or require a short walk of about 30 seconds to take in great water views.
But that also means there is not a lot of protection when the wind comes off the water which is what we have been experiencing. While I don’t consider myself a wimp, I do get cold and don’t enjoy myself that much when I’m shivering. It was fine during the day because it was just a matter of wearing extra layers but the below freezing nights were a little more challenging. We have a heater and blankets, and my husband has a sleeping bag. But because we don’t do winter camper his sleeping bag doesn’t have a “below freezing” rating. The heater in our popup worked great, until we ran out of propane in the middle of coldest night. We got propane the next morning but I felt chilled the entire day. And I thought I had plenty of blankets (5), but I think I could have used about 10 more!

So I guess I learned I’m more of a “fair-weather” camper because freezing cold and rainy weather does tend to dampen my enthusiasm, especially after a week of it! A day or two doesn’t bother me but the near constant presence of it that I experienced this camping trip made me realize that I get a wee bit crabby and cranky (just ask my husband, son and daughter).

Gosh, I sound like a total whiner don’t I?

It wasn’t all bad. We were camping and to me it’s like that goofy fishing sticker I see on vehicles that says “a bad day fishing is better than a good day at work.” That’s how I feel about camping. Even a bad trip is fun. We found ways to enjoy ourselves. On the worst of the cold and rainy days we took excursions to a couple of wineries and did some shopping at the local stores (I found some great warm sweatshirts that we immediately put to good use). Plus we spent 2 afternoons in the day use room at the park where there was a fireplace (we had to bring our own wood but that was no big deal). We played cards, visited with other campers, drank a little wine, had snacks, and watched the waves crash into the pier.

Plus the bad weather gave me the opportunity to visit with a local artist who had come to the park to paint the scenery and spent the afternoon in the day use room with us. She sampled our homemade wine and I got to try my hand at drawing and painting which was fun but obviously something I’ll never earn a living at. Even after my lesson and best effort to create something presentable, the small quick watercolor the artist did for me as a present and that literally took her less than 5 minutes to do was the clear family favorite. ” alt=”null” />

I got to keep the 2 drawings I made. When I took them over to the table where my family was playing cards I had my 2 drawings in my hand along with the one the artist had made. I made the mistake of saying “Look what I did.” My family immediately looked up at the paintings in my hand and said in unison “I like that one,” pointing to the one the artist had drawn. That’s when any glimmer of hope that I could earn a living as an artist was dashed since her 3 minute painting got raves and the 2 drawings I worked on for an hour got no comments at all (my family was obviously practicing “if you can’t say something nice don’t say anything at all.”).

The artist who kindly shared her time and patience with me, along with giving me a treasured memento of my trip, is Mary Anderson. If you get to the Door County area check out her work. It’s on display at the Paint Box Gallery in Ephraim.

We did get 1 beautiful day during the trip where the temperatures got up near 60 and where it was sunny which made the water a gorgeous blue.

We were a little early for color though so the pictures you see interspersed throughout this post have mostly green foliage.

At the time of the trip, gas prices were still over $3.50 a gallon and it certainly seemed to have kept people home. There were a lot of empty campsites, but the weather was probably a factor in keeping people home.

I still highly recommend taking a camping trip to Door County, Wisconsin. My first impression every time I get to that area of the state is that I’m entering a picturesque coastal area in New England. It really does have that kind of feel to it.

Happy Camping!