The Caged Animal Escapes to Kohler-Andrae

After working full time in an empty, doctor-less office for two weeks straight I felt like a caged animal and couldn't wait to pack up on Sunday and escape to Kohler-Andrae State Park for a few nights. I was hoping to see some of the monarch butterflies but either they're aren't on their way down to Mexico yet or they didn't make a stop here this time.

When I arrived after a 2 hour drive I quickly set up camp and hit the trail for the first run I've had in weeks. The mosquitoes are alive and well in Sheboygan, but they only bite if you stay still long enough for them to land on you!  After my run I was content to hide out in my cot for the rest of the evening eating my finger foods I'd brought along and staying up until midnight reading "The Hunger Games". I finished it all in one six hour read and it was captivating....but still not as good as the Harry Potter series. Of course the first in that series of books was nowhere near as good as the others, so perhaps when I read the other two I'll have to eat my words!

I camped in site 215 and the sites in this loop were smaller and closer together than other loops in the park.  If I return alone again I'll stay elsewhere though I did enjoy listening to the bullfrogs and cranes which I could hear off and on throughout the evening since we backed up to the marshy area. On my hour long walk around the campground on Monday morning I liked sites 61, 62, 69-72 and also 83 and 84 for privacy and roominess. They weren't close to the showers, but you can't have everything!







After my morning stroll I hopped in the car and drove around Sheboygan County to get a feel for the area and what I may or may not want to see when I come back again with Wayne. When I returned to the park I took a late afternoon nap and then was up again with my camera on my bike looking for things to shoot.. When I rode out onto Old Park Road and stopped at the guardrail I scared up a bunch of ducks and other birds. I took a chance and waited around to see if any of them would return and I got to see quite a variety.

 I was so excited I forgot that I should have changed the ISO on my camera, so they weren't as sharp as I would have liked, but I'll just have to try to remember to do it next time.  Birders out there...HELP! I tried to identify some of these using my books and the internet but did not have luck.

On Tuesday morning the cranes woke me up at 5:45 and I dashed off to the beach in my pajama pants to try to catch the sunrise. I got there just in time and had the beach to myself except for one other guy who stayed a few minutes with his camera and moved on. My persistence paid off and I got some shots I was pleased with in my hour and a half between the parking lot and the shore.

 I had made a reservation online at Kohler-Andrae for 3 nights, but it turned out that 2 nights were enough to make me feel human again...and I missed Wayne as much as I missed being outside so I decided to head home a day early. I stopped at the town of Cedarburg on the way back for a quick visit, but you'll have to wait a couple of posts to find out what I found there!