Wisconsin and Ham Lake, MN

We drove from LaPorte, Indiana yesterday morning, driving 268 miles, through Chicago on a Sunday morning. We were not going to drive into the city - were going to take I80 west and pick up I39 north about 50 miles west of Chicago - but. I80 had construction and detours - so we drove through the heart of Chicago - surprisingly without a problem! Too, too much traffic for us. Regardless, made it through the Windy City by 10am and headed up into Wisconsin. By 2pm we were at the Wisconsin Dells, and settling into the camp sight. It was 97 when we pulled in and with that said, I think Dave had heat exhaustion by the time he hooked up electric, water and cleaned the bugs off the nose of the unit and the front of the truck. He was pretty wasted the rest of the afternoon and never recovered fully until this morning. As a friend of mine (Count) used to say, and Dave didn't do, '"push the water"'. Thank goodness we had 50 amp service to run the a/c and it never shut off until about 3am this morning. Definitely made our night a noisy night (the a/c unit sits on top of the roof in the living room area).

This morning - up by 5am (they do not have daylight saving here) the birds were singing and it was very light out. Did I mention that it is dark here by 8:15pm? Got our showers, had breakfast, and by 8:45 we had pulled out of Fox Hill Campground. Today's drive was less than the other 2 - only (!!) 240 miles. Made good time but when we got near St. Paul, Minnesota, we could see lightning and a storm was building. Minneapolis/St. Paul had record highs yesterday and this storm which is still going on after 2 hours here, is supposed to break the hot spell. We weren't so lucky with the weather - within 45 minutes prior to our arrival time we came full force into the storm. Not fun at all driving and trying to figure out where you are going. The campground (Ham Lake Campground) is about 30 miles north of Minneapolis. Nice place - but they didn't have full-hookup which was promised to us when we made the reservations. We will only stay till this Friday then head north. Not sure yet if we will head towards Thunder Bay or go directly north to International Falls.