Traveling to camp can be an adventure in itself. It takes me about an hour and fifteen minutes to get there, depending on how law abiding I am speed wise and how many slow moving trucks I choose to pass. I actually passed my first semi on the way to camp. He was going far too slow. His destination must not have been someplace very interesting. If he was going to camp, I bet he would have gone a lot faster.

The first thing that determines my travel time is whether or not I can resist the temptation to go into Hardee's and have one last grease pig out. There is no way to avoid Hardee’s. It’s right there smack dab in the middle of US-2 on the way out of Iron Mountain. There is simply no way around it.

To go into Hardee’s or not is a debate I have with myself every single time I go to camp. It begins at the light in front of Subway when I start thinking about food. Hmm. Hardee’s is coming up once I get across the pit. Maybe I should stop. Then I weigh the pros and cons as I’m going over the pit. I suppose I should pay more attention to not driving into the pit, but it just consumes my mind.

Once I get past Hardee’s, I’m good. There is no other reason to stop until I actually get to camp.

I hate road kill. I can’t look at it. It's not pretty. Whenever I see some coming down the road I ignore it and pretend it's a pile of leaves or something. That, in case you’re wondering, doesn’t really work but trying it makes me feel like I am being sympathetic towards the poor animals.

Once I blinked, and I didn’t realize that I went through Channing and spent the rest of the trip wondering where it went. You always have to keep your eyes open for that town.

It’s not very hard to get to camp from Iron Mountain. You just have to keep going on the same road. Driving in a straight line---that's not the tricky part. It's the deer dodging and trying not to look at road kill at the same time that requires skill especially in October. Although, I’ve never actually gone to camp in October; I’m just guessing about that deer thing.

I am very grateful that I have never had to live in Republic. I get confused just passing it. It is a very messed up town. There's Old Republic and New Republic and South Republic and just plain Republic. I don't know why they need so many Republics. We do fine with only one Iron Mountain.

It's about this time that the Michigamme River pops up. I always have to remind myself that this is not camp, because seeing the name makes me excited. There's still a long way to go though.

You know what I love? Those big white and blue rocks. They are quite lovely. Well...........they would be if some boneheads hadn't trashed them with graffiti. Someone loves Cat. I wonder if they mean the drug cat or someone actually named Cat. I think someone should write ‘my’ in front of ‘Cat’ so it says ‘I Love My Cat.’ Then the person who wrote it would get all upset. Also, Bob was there, and someone loves Mary. I am so glad Bob wrote that he was there. If he hadn’t, I’d wonder every time I passed those rocks if he’d been there or not. There are also some nice four letter words and initials. It's actually pretty interesting stuff.

Some of the graffiti rocks have been cleaned up and re-graffitied, but others have stood the test of time. I remember the first year I went to camp (1989) as a real camper (not just a visitor of my dad). That was when I first paid attention to the graffiti rocks, and something that caught my attention was the name MARY JANE in big block letters. Well, I just got back from camp about three hours ago (I’m doing my final edit of this right now on July 26, 1997 at 3:43 real time {4:43 camp time}) and MARY JANE is still there. Nine camping seasons her name has littered that rock without being cleaned up, written over, or dirtied beyond readability. Now, that’s a darn fine accomplishment.

There are many graffiti rocks along the way, and I have to stick with that road until the bitter end. I hope they never take down the sign that says ‘MARQUETTE’ with the arrow on it, because that’s how I know which way to turn. I know not to go to Marquette. If they ever take that sign down, I will have to flip a coin to decide which way to go. I’m not very good at calling a coin toss, so that might be a problem.

Then I get to pass through my very favorite town in the entire world (ha, ha), CHAMPION!!! Now I don't mean to rip on other people's towns (unless of course it's Gwinn; in that case I mean it), but Champion is an annoyance to me (and any other person who passes it going to camp) because the speed limit all the way from I.M. to camp is 55 mph. Now I want to get there as fast as I can, because it is such a cool place. An hour and fifteen minute drive isn't much fun (especially with the road kill). So when Champion comes along, and I have to slow down (uh, I'm supposed to slow down) to 40 mph, it's kind of a bummer. I wouldn't mind if it was for awhile or if people were actually trying to cross the street, but Champion is about two blocks long. Three, tops if you count the outskirts of Champion.

I have found out a way to make going through Champion fun (this only works if you have cruise control and are amused easily). Since I have to slow down anyway, instead of slowing to 40 I slow all the way to like 2 so the car’s barely crawling along. This takes up pretty much the whole town. Then I hit the RESUME button on my steering wheel, and the car suddenly starts to climb to 55 again. I don't know why this amuses me so much, but it is the only fun thing I have found to do in Champion ever.

Whenever I pass Woodland Church I remember one time when I was there and the minister told the congregation to greet one another. There was this guy who went around greeting every single person in every single pew. He was on a mission impossible or something. He had to say good morning to everybody or he’d flip. We thought that was pretty funny. That’s all I ever think about when I go there now. That guy wasn’t there last year when I went. I was disappointed. I wanted to see if he would be the undisputed greeter champion of the church again.

Anyhow, I start thinking about that man and usually end up seeing the Camp Michigamme sign too late. I have to slow down very quickly and turn. I don’t think the people behind me like it when I do this.

All in all, the drive to camp can be pretty interesting.

Well, not really.

Never mind.