This past weekend, an old friend from college and his girlfriend came up to Traverse City. Chris and I used to hang and bond over cycling and he has gone on a few tours within the state.

When I met up with Chris and Sabrina, they had mountain bikes and planned on camping somewhere in TC. After hopping on Aretha and showing them around, we decided to crash up at the disc golf course in the west side of town. It’s a beautifully wooded place at the end of the road, without any traffic at night.

Sabrina was asleep in the car from a long day, so Chris and I set up our shelters. It was second time planned to sleep in the Hennessy Hammock… the first one was where I was rained out by the sprinklers. :-p

I set up my hammock without any lights and did a pretty good job. I borrowed a stake from Chris because the trees to tie the rainfly to were too far away.

Chris, on the other hand, set up a MSR Hubba Hubba tent. It was his first time setting it up, but he was done in about the time I was – no more than 5 minutes.

We got our sleeping bags, made our places up, and peeled Sabrina off the car seat. I hopped into my hammock, expecting a nice, relaxing night. Before we went to bed, we checked the radar map and saw a fat stream of thunderstorms coming our way. It was going to be a fun night.

At about 1:45am, we all were in bed and falling alseep. And the rain started to come. Hard.

Chris claimed it was the hardest thunderstorm he’s witnessed all summer. It was intense!

Long story short, we all had crazy dreams, slept well, and woke up dry. My hammock braved the weather, kept me dry and allowed me to sleep well enough.

I would say that I was a bit envious of their ability to sleep together. Sleeping in a hammock, all alone, without your partner nearby is a bit of an inconvenience. Not to mention the issue if there are not 3-4 trees close by to tie up to.

When I came home, I decided to call Kristen and talk about tenting. She was 100% down for tenting.

Today, I won an ebay auction for a Hubba Hubba for $220. $20 s/h means I got it for $60 off the price of a new one. Good enough for us!

And… another Hennessy Hammock would have cost near $160-180. This is a much better shelter — and we’ll be able to use it when we head out west.

Wooo!

Finally – today, I’m putting in my “2-weeks notice” which is actually about 3 weeks. I love the bar that I work at, and want to give them time to fill the position properly. Should be a fun conversation with the bar manager.

I’m taking the last week of Aug off to focus on some mobile work, clean up my living space, and get some more miles under me.

Chris, Sabrina, Kristen and I are planning a 5 day trip around northern Michigan on Sept 2. It’d be nice to have some experienced riders come ride with use before the trip.

— Casey “Hubba Hubba” Stanton