Sonya's Blog - Day 36 - Green Bay and Door County

Sonya’s Blog - Day 36 - July 28th - Green Bay and Door County

We decided to take Kizmet with us today. Green Bay is not very large and the #1 tourist attraction is Lambeau Stadium. Blake also found a State Park that looked interesting that was supposed to be like an outdoor Museum. When we arrived at Heritage Hills State Park we quickly discovered that it was not so much a park as a place like Heritage Park in Calgary with paid admission and no pets allowed. So we left and went to Lambeau Stadium. It is a Tuesday so we figured the Stadium wouldn’t be so busy because Training camps don’t start until next week. When we got there it was packed and all the fans were coming and going in their jersey’s and you could here the announcer, but not what he was saying. We finally found a parking spot , I went to walk Kizmet and Blake and the kids went to check out what was going on. It was the Annual Shareholders Meeting. They had give aways and draws (one for a trip and the other one for a truck). They had the shareholders in the stadium and the announcer was going through the financials and the outlook for the season. Blake said it was amazing how many people were in the stands listening to the announcer. They love their Packers in Green Bay and it is phenomenal that a town that size can have a competitive and successful NFL franchise. The Stadium is fantastic.

We went in to town afterwards, found a park to walk around in. Right next to the park was an old railway station that had been converted to a Brewery/Restaurant with the patio area where the platform used to be. We went up and asked if we could sit on the patio with our dog and it was not a problem as long as Kizmet was well behaved and quiet. Well that is not a problem for Kizmet as she is so good. We took a table at the end of the platform so Kizmet wouldn’t be between tables and ordered lunch. It was quite hot and Kizmet was loving the ice-cubes from my water glass. We had a great lunch and Kizmet did her part by being quiet and super well behaved.

After lunch we walked up and down broadway for a bit and looked in some of the boutiques they had there.

We thought we had better get on the road if we wanted to check out Door County and the Peninsula. The Peninsula juts out from Wisconsin, with Green Bay on one side (the actual Bay, not the town) and Lake Michigan on the other. You can drive up one side and back down the other. At the tip you can take the ferry over to Washington Island. It is not a huge peninsula, only about a 40 minute drive to the tip once you are in Sturgeon Bay. However there are lots of little bays and cute little towns along the way, so lots of stopping opportunities. We were about 50 minutes away from Sturgeon Bay so we hightailed it there and then stopped at the Tourist Info Center to get a map and a plan for the rest of the afternoon. We decided to go up the Lake Michigan side and then come back down the Green Bay side once we were done.

Our first stop was Cave Point County Park, which was amazing. Due to the geological make-up, there were cliff’s and caves all along the shore of Lake Michigan on that area. It was really neat and looked like the Ocean. We hiked around and got some great pictures.

Cave Point:

Inukshuks at Cave Point:

We got down on one of the ledges, and Kizmet had lots of fun trying to catch the waves with her mouth. She drank a lot of water!

We then drove up the coast to Jacksonport and stopped for some Frozen Custard and to walk around. Natasha still had not bought her key chain for Wisconsin and this was her last chance. They had a really neat pier area and a great mural. I also went up to an overlook and read about a famous shipwreck from the 1800’s when schooners were used for transporting goods. A schooner had gone down in winter weather while trying to get into Jackson port for safe harbour. It is in about 15 feet of water and is a National Historic site and you can go and snorkel or scuba dive in that area and check out the shipwreck. All 8 of the crew managed to get off the ship and make it to shore. It was a quaint little town and I was quickly falling in love with Door County.

We continued on our way up the coast. It was getting later so after Bailey’s Harbour we decided to cross the Peninsula so we could come down the other side. We ended up in Ephraim after about 10 minutes (it is not a very wide Peninsula) and Ephraim was so lovely and quaint. They had a lovely sand beach there and we stopped to dip our toes in really quickly. We could not take Kimet on the beach so the kids and I went down, it was amazing how much warmer the water was on the Bay side and lovely sand beaches. Now the rocky shore was fantastic for exploring and hiking around, and some crazy kids were jumping off the rocks and swimming. However, the sand beach is nice for an outing for swimming and goofing around.

We continued on our way and our next town was Fish Creek and this was the busiest center so far on our route. Very quaint and a real sea-side feel. Lots of boutiques and unique places to eat. Door County is famous for it’s fish boils (a Scandanavian thing). Most of the fish boils we saw were on Friday nights or the weekend though. Right before we got into Fish Creek I saw a drive-in theatre. For those of you who don’t know Blake loves Drive-in’s and gets really nostalgic about them. I am not such a huge fan, but Blake and the kids think they are the bomb. Blake was super excited about going to the drive-in because they were showing Minions and Jurassic World, two movies he wanted to see and Isaac as well. Once these boys hooked onto the idea of going, there was no turning back. I did point out we have a long day of driving tomorrow as we are heading back into Canada and if we went to the movies we would not be back to camp until about 1:30 AM. Blake’s response, “well it is not the responsible choice, but is the fun choice so we are going. We needed to find somewhere to eat. We still had a couple of hours until showtime. So Fish Creek was quite busy and we really wanted to see Egg Harbour, which was about 10 more minutes up the road.

We continued on and were soon in Egg Harbour. We found a parking spot and walked up to the nearest restaurant with a patio. They had no problem with Kizmet joining us on the patio and even brought her a bowl of water. We had a view of the Bay and it was lovely. The sun was setting and it was a wonderful pink sky and the sun turned redder and redder. By the time we were done eating the sun was just about to drop below the bay and it was bright red and magnificent. Here is a picture:

Egg Harbour was another super quaint town and I could seriously spend a lot of time in Door County either in a cottage or camping. We will need to go back one day so we can have more time. It is one of my favourite areas so far. Blake filled up the truck while we paid the bill and got some pictures of the sunset and then we hopped in the truck and headed back to the drive-in. We got there 5 minutes before showtime, but they never start on time. It was about 2/3rd full, but the screen was high enough that it didn’t matter where you parked, the cars in front did not obstruct the view. We got all set up and then the show started, and only 10 minutes late which I think is a record in our drive-in experiences. Minions was suiper cute, as they tend to be. They only had a short intermission between the two films. Jurrassic World had some good graphics, but it was a lot like Jurrasic Park. It was okay. I guess there were some good dinosaur fighting scenes, if you like that. Chris Pratt was super cute and cocky, as usual, so he was good.

We bolted out of there once the movie was over and were the 3rd or 4th car to exit. We made it back to the campground by 1:20 and straight to bed. Hopefully we will have a good drive tomorrow and not too late a start. It is about a 7 hour drive to Sault St Marie.

Sonya