Camping Tips From A Fall Trip Around The Great Lakes

For the last two weeks, I had the chance to take a trip I've wanted to take for about a decade. I have always wanted to drive around the Great Lakes during the fall season. Here are some of the times I learned, as well as a short roadmap as to where I stayed, and what to expect if you feel the need to take the same sort of trip, in the future.

3 Things I Learned While Camping Around The Great Lakes In The Fall

1. Check your firewood that you get. I had a few campgrounds that were offering firewood for sale, and while most places offered up some great firewood, there were some places we opted to pass on making the purchase in the park. Make sure the firewood you are getting has stayed dry, as there isn't anything more frustrating than trying to light wet wood.

2. Make time to stop along the way. What was nice about our trip was that we pulled our campsite around behind us, meaning we often had the time and the means to pull over and take in the sights around us. When planning this trip, we consciously didn't schedule lots of stops and activities as we wanted to simply enjoy the colors and each other's company. Some of the best pictures/moments we had weren't scheduled, but organically created when we saw a great overlook, or an interesting point of interest along the highway.

3. Have scrap wood of all shapes and sizes. Leveling out a trailer feels like a science to some, for others, it's just having the right pieces/equipment with you. We took off on our trip with 4 different pieces of wood for leveling out the trailer. By the end of the trip, I had tripled my leveling collection.

A List Of Places We Stayed Along The Way

While we were on the trip, we used AI to generate some ideas of campgrounds to stay at while we camped and peeped leaves around the Great Lakes. While we were in Canada, we found ourselves staying exclusively at Provincial Parks, and they were fantastic. They were inexpensive to stay at, while offering 'comforts' at the same time as being surrounded by nature.

• Sleeping Giant Provincial Park
• Lake Superior Provincial Park - Agawa Bay
• Kilkenny Provincial Park
• Killbear Provincial Park
• Scott's Campground - Niagara Falls
• Sarah's Campground - Erie PA
• Proud Lake State Park - Michigan
• National Lakeshore Park -Platte River Campground- Michigan
• KOA - UP
• Barage State Park - Michigan
• Copper Falls State Park - WI
• Pattison State Park - WI

Expectations For Fall Color Camping

Pack for all kinds of temps and types of weather. We got lucky and didn't really hit any cold/windy weather until the tail end of the trip in the UP and parts of Wisconsin. Oftentimes, we'd layer up in the morning with a sweatshirt and jeans, but by the afternoon, we'd change into a t-shirt and maybe a pair of shorts.

Not all of the parks we were looking to stop at were open in the US, as we were traveling at the tail end of the camping season, so we made due with what was open, and made sure we had plenty of propane and water in the camper in case we were showering in the camper versus a campground comfort station.

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Finally, try to remember why you are on vacation in the first place. Having a positive mental attitude each day helped us out, especially when we were missing some of our creature comforts at home.

Happy camping.