Day One: Illinois–a great ‘found’ dinner site
We visited a wonderful friend who is dying in Chicago and had a good visit. He’s been in the hospital since, so it was good timing.
Then we drove south on I-55 (or whatever it is) through the center of Illinois for a few hours. And hours. There was nothing. No town, no place to stop and fix or eat a dinner, no rest area. Suddenly we crossed the Des Plaines river on a huge, glorious silver bridge. I glanced below and saw a semi-abandoned industrial shoreline and crappy marina. Then we were across and I saw newer huge industry and an exit. Let’s check it out! We turned around and wangled our way through bumpy, broken-up frontage roads and trashed or nonexisting signage among various bouncing, dust-strewing semi-trucks and bashed-up pickups to the marina area. A rough’n’tumble area, eh? There was a dive-bar with patio on the water. An old marina with a bunch of half-sunk smallcraft, and the ruins of industry. But across the large river was a running factory. We drove around the vacant lots and found what I knew we’d find: beat up old picnic tables near the marina and the edge of the river. A perfect place for dinner!
We stopped. I unloaded the cover, food box, and prepped the stove, then said “C’mon, kids, let’s explore!” Martha set to cooking and looking around our weird new world from her vantage and I got the kids out of her hair and all our big and little legs unkinked. We traipsed our way around big green puddles of hydro-fluid and mounds of coal to the river’s edge. The shore was continuous old loading dock with a 10-foot drop to murky water. Let’s stay away from here, kids! A couple pickups pulled up to an old shed in the distance for awhile then rolled away. Busted up cranes broke up the open skyline. I like old industry. There was a huge old 70’s era motoryacht about 100 feet long, 20 feet wide and 30 feet tall, on a makeshift set of 3 trailers welded together, all tires flat, in a sloping slot that led to the water. A dream that never launched. It looked like it came from a very rough homemade mold. It looked like it looked terrible even when new. An enormous slapdash yacht. Its backbone had broken over the trailers and it sat there slumped. Ouch. A floating factory was being fabricated farther down the shore. Interesting. Back a ways behind some buildings another yacht sat under a shed roof and tarp. Equally as neglected as the first. Clearly a lost dream. Yet. This sailing yacht was in perfect shape. The tarps looked about 20 years old, tearing and rotting, yet they still protected. There was a solid, functional look to this boat still. Mothballed, but with potential. Masts on sawhorses alongside. Easily a globetrotter. Even now. I wonder what dreams are still remotely connected to this boat.
We wander back and a tablecloth is spread and dinner is ready. Ah, yes. A perfect meal. Across the river about a half mile away a tug is pushing a loaded barge away from the active mill. The kids love it. Traffic streams over the beautiful bridge. A perfect resting place for the start of our trip. Thanks for being here. Then we’re rolling again.
But we stop on the other side of the river. We can’t make STL tonight and it’s getting dark and we’ve never set up our tent and we wonder where we might camp in this region and the guidebook says Right here! An exit appears with “State Park” noted. Sure enough we find a campground. No one is there. It’s getting dark. It’s a new campground and there are fresh campsites cut into dark woods going to swamp along the river. The sites down in old wet pools mostly. Yuck. There’s a new playground in the evening light in a big mowed grass field higher up, next to two handicap sites. The kids start playing on the swings and we go to set up in one of the sites. There’s light to see here and no one around. I unload a bunch of boxes and start to set up the tent. From a half mile away we see in the gloom a pickup pull into the campground. It slowly drives around until a ranger lady tells me we have to move because it’s a handicap site. I tell her this sucks and is stupid. She says “It’s the rules.” I ask if they’ve ever had a handicapper visit. Blah-blah. I say “How about if two handicappers show up then we’ll gladly move as we wouldn’t want to put anyone out.” Blah-blah. OK, we’ll move. In her headlights I see a large moth flapping. Big as your hand, flapping like a piece of tissue. My God! A luna moth! My first ever! Should I lunge to catch it? We brought nets, where’s a net? Is it endangered and the ranger lady will ticket me and arrest me? They get me no matter what I do. (Ever try to catch a snake or turtle near a cop? They feel compelled to tell you it’s illegal even though it isn’t.) I hesitate. It flaps away into the night. We set up camp in a damp and gloomy site.
It’s a new tent. A $100 special. We spent an hour at the camping store trying to figure out the tent situation. Buying modern camp equipment with the help of young clerks is hilarious. They know all the high-tech info. The direction is to get you into a “quality” high-end tent. Everest-worthy, of course. There are hundreds of factors to consider and compare. It’s easy to get sucked into a morass of yuppy-style research shopping. In the end we went with the simplest tent that seemed to have enough room. We had been camping with our old 2-man dome tent. 4 of us and our big dog were in it this spring. Ha. We thought of using it on this trip then said NO. Our parents had a big oldstyle tent: 100 pounds with dozens of poles. I can set it up no problem. But once up it really should stay up a few days. So we bought a cheapy Eureka 4-man dome. Screw that. We’re car camping. It’s summer. We’ll risk it. I bought the tent with the fewest poles. Just two! I can set it up in moments. The tent worked great the whole trip.
