My son and I had just the best time at Double Lake this weekend... I've missed that place!
We were in site 15 (standard, non-electric), right near one of the bath houses. All the lakefront sites were full, unfortunately, but the lake was right there across the road anyway. And since the sites directly across from us were open (apparently un-reservable, since they don't even show up on the facility map on the website) we were able to just trek right through them to get to the lake.
I love Double Lake for several reasons: the sites are far enough apart that you don't feel like you're right next to anyone, everything is so well-maintained with nice, flat gravel tent pads and super-clean bathrooms, and it's just so amazingly quiet and peaceful there. Lying in the tent just staring at the trees overhead and listening to the wind in the branches was pure bliss. Even my typical-12-year-old-boy son commented, "It's kinda nice to not hear a t.v. in the background!"
And everyone is so nice there! On Saturday morning we were sitting at the picnic table enjoying a post-breakfast game of Farkle, and the caretaker lady pulled up to the bath house in her golf cart to make sure everything was shipshape. She came over to our site to say hi and pet our dog, and brought my son a goodie bag of candies and a Koolaid Jammer. It was just so nice, and the kind of touch that we have always seemed to have had at Double Lake.
I have to admit -- we were COLD Friday night!!
But that was partially my fault, as I had somehow forgotten one of the sleeping bags. We needed a new one anyway, so a quick trip to the Walmart in Cleveland solved that and we were much warmer Saturday night.
The only other problem we had was that our wood was wet, and we never could really get a fire going. The tinder and kindling would burn just fine, but the logs would just smolder. So now we have an extra bundle in the garage, so it will hopefully be dry and ready to burn by next time.
We just had a great time, and we're already ready to go back. But the next long weekend isn't until Memorial Day... and I'm afraid I'd have a heat stroke. (I really, really hate the heat.) The only reason I'm thinking about a long weekend is because it was so hard getting there this past Friday. I even left work a little early, but by the time we stopped and got the couple of groceries we needed, got gas, and got up to Coldspring, it was already dark. Setting up camp at that point was very difficult. I'm really torn about the Memorial Day thing -- the lakefront site we really wanted is somehow still available that weekend, but I'm really worried about the heat. I'd be just miserable if it was 95 degrees all weekend.
Oh well, I'll make up my mind one way or another.
It may not be until fall that we get to go back, but we're looking forward to it whenever it is!
-gina-