Ausable Point Campground - Adventures on Magnificent Lake Champlain

Last fall, Alan and I enjoyed a short camping trip to State Parks in Vermont and New York that were completely new to us, followed by a week at a waterfront site on our beloved Great Lake Sacandaga.  I detailed the first leg of the journey in a recent post about Half Moon Pond State Park and our adventures in the Vermont countryside (link HERE).  Our family time at the Northampton Beach Campground on Sacandaga was covered in a post back in October (“I Just Love these Guys to Pieces” - link HERE).  So this post is the third and final one recounting the time we spent on the middle leg of our journey, camping at Ausable Point.  I know that was completely out of order but family always comes first! 

When Alan and I left Half Moon Pond State Park in Fair Haven, Vermont, we turned our wheels westward and made our way to Ausable Point Campground in Peru, New York.  To say that we were excited about this next stop would be an understatement.  Since we are campers and boaters, the opportunity to camp directly on the shore of Lake Champlain held a huge appeal and we were most definitely looking forward to our first stay at Ausable Point.

Celebrating National Park Week 2019 – Why It’s Impossible for Me to Choose a Favorite Park

National Park Week 2019 runs from Saturday, April 20^th, through Sunday, April 28^th, with a “fee-free” day on the 20^th to kick off the week of celebration.  Other “fee-free” days during 2019 are August 25th (the birthday of the National Park Service), September 28th (National Public Lands Day) and November 11^th (Veterans Day), so mark your calendar accordingly.  Spring is a perfect time of year to get out and enjoy our national treasures, and many of our National Parks have special events scheduled during the week.  Plus, the National Park Service has assigned a theme to many of the days during National Park Week such as Junior Ranger Day on April 20^th and Bark Ranger Day on April 27^th.  (Yes!  Some National Parks and Monuments do allow pets!)  National Park Week focuses on the beauty and benefits of these glorious public lands – OUR public lands - and the countless opportunities that exist for us to enjoy them.

Photo credit:  www.nps.gov

Many of you know that our love affair with our National Parks began back when Alan and I honeymooned by tent camping across the country on a journey to visit several of the iconic Parks in the American West.  Currently, there are 61 National Parks in existence, but properties managed by the National Park Service number 419 and include National Monuments, Battlefields, Military Parks, Historical Parks, Historic Sites, Lakeshores, Seashores, Recreation Areas, Scenic Rivers and Trails, and the White House.  We’ve made a dent in that list, but we still have a long way to go to see them all.  (Interesting tidbit of information:  The largest National Park is Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve in Alaska at 13.2 million acres, and the smallest is the Thaddeus Kosciuszko Memorial in Pennsylvania at 0.02 acres.)  With all of those Parks to choose from, (okay, Mike, I admit it should be “from which to choose”), the question that inevitably comes up is, “Which National Park is your favorite?”