Recently I stayed in a mini-cabin at Metamora-Hadley Recreation Area near Lapeer, MI (located east of Flint). I also paid a second visit to Seven Lakes State Park – a park I hadn’t visited since I was a teenager! I remember being so pooped out from playing in the water with a couple of my girlfriends that I slept in the car on our way home! It was in the back seat of a Buick Skylark, so for a tall gal like me, those were pretty cramped accommodations! When sleep wants to find a way, it finds a way!

The mini-cabin we stayed in was one of two cabins available for rent at Metamora-Hadley. The other cabin is a larger camper cabin.

As a huge lover of being outdoors, I try to find a way to visit as many of Michigan’s state parks as I can. With my work schedule being as busy as it’s been lately, that can be a challenge!

For this recent visit to Metamora-Hadley Recreation Area, my husband was recruited to pack the gear into the car, and he picked me up from work in Ann Arbor at 5:30 p.m. on a Friday. We knew starting a trip this late in the day wouldn’t be ideal and we’d likely arrive after dark (which we did).

When we arrived, I had to unlock a “lock box” on the cabin, which is not something I do every day. Reading the numbers on the padlock was a challenge in the dark (even with my headlamp)! We knew the cabin furnishings would be pretty “spartan.” There was an electric light and a couple of electrical outlets, but no heat, no fridge, no microwave. We packed a small electric heater, so no problem!

Note: I would later learn after reading a book by outdoor enthusiast and Michigan native Jim Dufresne that this mini cabin is the oldest in the Michigan State Park system. It kind of makes me appreciate the experience all the more! I don’t know when it was first available for rental.

We struggled a bit to get a fire going on the first night since it’s kind of difficult scrounging for kindling in the dark. I found some scrap paper in the car (old receipts, etc.) and squirted some hand sanitizer on them and lit with long fireplace matches. I was admonished for using too many of the matches, but I knew it would be cheap to buy more for our next camping trip (Halloween weekend), so yeah…I was an undutiful wife and didn’t listen to my husband! The fire did get going, though, so there’s that!

Here’s a pic of the cabin from the outside:

The next day, we had a nice breakfast in Lapeer (Apple Tree Restaurant, which I highly recommend) – I had oatmeal with blueberries and walnuts and turkey sausage, he had potato pancakes. When we got back to camp, with our carbs nicely loaded into our bodies, we hit the trails! There are more than six miles of hiking trails at this park, and we did a lovely hike around the entirety of Lake Minnewanna, an artificial lake created by a dam.

The trails were “just right” for the two of us older hikers! Challenging enough to let you know you’re taking a real hike, but not so challenging that we’d regret not bringing a defibrillator! Nice little rolling hills, some roots to navigate by foot, and so much beautiful scenery! I was particularly interested in checking out the little island:

We hiked back along some park roads to get back to our campground, and I was able to get a decent shot of the swimming beach.

We had a nice leisurely afternoon after that! He took a little nap in the cabin, I lounged outside near the picnic table with some tunes and my Thermacell. What’s that, you ask? Basically a vaping device, but for discouraging mosquitoes! Yes, they really work! Take it from a lifelong mosquito magnet!

The camp site we were on had its quirks! It was pretty unlevel, so much so that our picnic table was on a slant, and so was the little charcoal grill! Since I had no decent place to cook dinner with our little backpacking butane stove, we went to Hungry Howie’s to pick up dinner. And after that, it was “drink ‘o clock!” I cracked open a Bell’s Two-Hearted, and determined it to be the “unofficial beer of Michigan campfires.”

Well, what are you waiting for? Go out and do a cabin trip now! Getting outside makes me this happy: