I headed North to Greenville, MI from my tin can home here in Indiana. First stop was to pick up Will. When I arrived we had our usual palavar in the garage. After loading up the car with his gear we took off North once again to Bowman Lake near Baldwin, MI.

We found this little gem of a lake about four years ago while hiking on the North Country Trail. It has only four campsites around the lake. There is a parking area that you can either choose to take the short way to the lake or the route on the NCT, which is only maybe half a mile or so.

On this adventure we decided on the short walk to the lake to get setup quickly in case mother nature decided it was time to get wet. I don’t know about you folks, but I like to skip the setting up in the rain if I can.

Will and I decided to continue our experiment with tents for this trip. Will had just bought a new solo tent he was dieing to try out. What better way to do that than a weekend in wet conditions? I went with my Ozark Trail tent I’ve had for a few years now. It’s a pretty standard backpacking tent. One of those two person, 3lb, and easy to set up contraptions. Overall, its a good tent that I have carried many miles. Also, not a bad choice to get the kids out camping on the trails in.

Now that we had tents ready to go we started work on the chore collecting firewood. Pretty much my favorite camp chore of all. The only time this chore is difficult at Bowman is probably more towards end of summer after its been picked quite a bit. Even in wet conditions finding good stuff to burn isn’t very complicated. We needed a good hot fire for our dinner, and coffee, of course.

So, a couple days before this trip Will had mentioned getting those one dollar burritos from the deli at Walmart. At first I was iffy about the idea of greasy burritos out where your only way to take a shit was hovering over a hole in the dirt. The thing is though, when I went to get my supplies I couldn’t stop thinking about those damn burritos. I grabbed two.

We got the fire nice and hot, which was good, because the temperature was only in the low forties. Still no rain had come, but the threat of it was close and sure by the look of the sky. Now that the fire was ready, we got the burritos wrapped in foil and tossed on the grate. The flames kicked up a little and after warming them over coals for a bit we set them directly in the open flames on each side for a few minutes. Will wrapped his seperatley and I wrapped both of mine together. The two different ways seemed to make no difference and were done about the same time. As far as the taste, let me just say I can no longer eat a frozen burrito the same ever again. This is a must as a camping meal whether you are hiking or just relaxing, makes no difference. Simply fantastic!

I should have mentioned this earlier, but I bought a chair at Walmart before we went out. This chair was a great idea. Rather than my back and ass be sore from a wooden bench it allowed a comfortable sit next to the fire. Will has one almost just like it but a different brand purchased on Amazon. His is possibly a bit lighter with the same design, for the most part. With the combination of the chairs and those delicious burritos I just had to make a cup of coffee and stare oblivious at the lake and surrounding forest for an hour or more.

The rain came in after the sun had been down for a couple of hours. Will brought a crunchy blue tarp for the occasion that we had pitched above the picnic tables that had been added to the Bowman experience a year ago. The only issue we had with that idea is the best place for the picnic table was in the worst place for the smoke path from the fire. Sure, we could have put the table behind us and sat comfortably out of the smoke, but we would have sacrificed the view of the lake, which was not about to happen. We battled the wicked path of smoke and off and on rain for awhile until we had had enough and through out the white flags and crawled in our tents; defeated, but happy as hell to stretch out.

When I awoke in the morning I heard the rain still pelting my tent and felt my bladder nearing it’s eruption. I slipped my shoes and raincoat on and made quick work of the deed. As I crawled back in my quilt I heard Will stirring around. We had our wake-up coffee while chatting from within the comforts of our warm quilts and dry tents. Will was satisfied with his wet night in his new tent. We both agreed that cold wet mornings such as this one were better spent under the tarp swinging in the trees.

Packing up was a slow process. Neither man, nor gear wanted to depart the comforts of Bowman Lake. Unfortunately, it was something that had to be done. The time must always come to head back to the mundane cycle of our daily lives; forever dreaming of the slow pace days of the woods.