La Crosse and Wine day

Though we would take an easy day today. Heading south today. Maybe visit a couple of wineries and check out La Crosse.
As we were heading to our first winery for the day, (Yes it was just after noon time) and yes planned on having alittle wine with our cheese. As we were heading south and passed La crosse to Vernon Winery it was a beautiful scenic ride down to Mighty Miss just before our turn here's another lock and dam with a big tug and quite a few cargo floats going through had to do it in two runs. 

Now off to the first winery It was beautiful we all the people was so nice we met the owner and the wine maker and the wine makers wife was serving us our wine. Beautiful people, beautiful vineyard plus a wedding going on. Did not want to leave it just felt so relaxing. 

 Cheese and wine how wonderful

 A wine slushie

Hey boys show me what you got haha

Now sights from the road

 Town fire truck small population do you think

Hows chicken?

Our second winery was only 12 miles from the first one. Wait is the radio on no its music oh my there's a band playing at this winery. Nice girl and guy duo she sings really good, good rock and roll.

Nice teachers working the wine tasting its a summer gig for them. Wine was not bad either but really busy.

now lets end the trip at La Crosse. The town with the largest six pack. Yep 

Walk the town and the river front

 Duluth definitely has its unique advertising

The La Crosse Queen

Wisconsin the second day The Leap of Faith

OK hope day two in a bit more exciting then the first one. So now we are going to try Wisconsin Dells. Going to try a boat tour look good, let see. So we travel an hour and half to here. WOW a tourist area for sure. Largest water parks, restaurants, Saloons?, Chain rest. Ripley's, al the makings of a tourist place. Find the boat tour place and grab our tickets, 2 hour boat ride with two stops on trails. We had an awesome journey through the hidden passages of Witches Gulch and then the famous trademark of the Dells, Stand Rock. Where the famous jump happened at stand rock. Known as the LEAP OF FAITH. A photographer Henry Hamilton Bennett was trying to prove the concept of photojournalism, invented a stop action shutter (which he called the “snapper”), improved the speed of the chemical exposure process. 
In 1886, Bennett took his iconic shot of his son Ashley jumping the five and a half feet from Stand Rock to a ledge and back to show how his shutter could freeze action. Ashley had to jump seventeen times before his father thought he had the perfect shot. Some people initially thought the photograph was a trick, because in those days capturing an exposure took a long time, which is why everyone looks so glum in their portraits. They had to stand still, not moving a muscle. 

His photographs attracted throngs of tourists to the beauty of the sandstone gorges of the Wisconsin River Dells.  (The city of Wisconsin Dells is also now the self-proclaimed Waterpark Capital of the World.)

DELISH buffalo mac and cheese and jalapeño bacon and cream cheese mac HUMMMMM

Of course after eating that mac and cheese I felt like a cow so I thought this picture was fitting haha.
Now with full bellies we explore the town of wisconsin dells. Purchase....well guess...of course some cheese at the cheese factory.
After all that it was time to sit a bit thought we would check out the Show Boat Saloon where happy hour the beers are all $2.50. Eat your heart out Terry Mccurley....
Actually got to say I had a great beer. It was a fruit beer. New Glarus Raspberry Tart. OMG so good.

 Now tourists watch a German Shepherd make the leap. You have to be quick to take your own stop-action photograph, because the dog makes the leap only once. 

We both got, damn we good. The whole 2 hours were wonderful and so enjoyable. Interest about the The Dells of the Wisconsin River (also called Wisconsin Dells) is a 5-mile stretch of river with gorges and stunning Cambrian sandstone rock formations.These formations are only known to exist in 4 places around the world. WOW. Originally referred to as the ‘Dalles’ (narrows) by the French, the Wisconsin Dells is home to some of the most beautiful natural sandstone sculptures in the US! Some of the unique cliff faces tower over 100ft above the rushing waters of the Wisconsin River.

So now we are staving we waited to take this trip about 45 minutes gone for 2 hours, it time to eat, its 3 wow way pass lunch. Got to check with my good friend Tripadvisor. Oh look a mac and cheese place called MACS

Time to head back. Nice sunset to end the day.

First day in Wisconsin

So our first day in Wisconsin started with of course figuring do we go north or south on the mighty Mississippi. But first lets go to the Dam Locks then decide. With coffee in hand and brochure off we go.  Get to the locks and there's a pleasure boat going thur, that's ok but we wanted to see the big stuff. After the boat goes though we talk with the operator. Well talked with him quite awhile when we asked about generation of power and why it did not. And found out he is one of the Army Corp. Divers. Oh my, then the words began to flow for all of us. (Like it takes much for us) But it was an interesting talk and he has traveled to many parts of the country and has been in Maine and around too.
After that we decided to head North. Reading in the Wisconsin Brochure (keep this in mind for later)
we head north to see all the quaint little towns along the river.
Oh my the town that we are camping in Trempealeau, WI as you enter into town you see signs of a catfish festival coming up and then this....

And believe me this sign is not small it is the town sign probably about 20 feet long.
Small main street some old buildings. Population 1615.
Ok let keep on next town Fountain City (brochure states pleasure vistas and terrace gardens, museum and sculpture gardens and folk art) Sound good. As we hit the town line and read the sign POP 830 hummm not to big but ok.

Yes they do have gardens.
Ok next town, Alma, wow nice picture in brochure great coming into town population 752. OK let see so we actually stopped looked around.

OK marketing for sure the next town states "Top small Town Getaways" and we see the town sign and it states POP 66 (Really) I'm seeing a pattern here....
In Between all these small towns we found a concrete sculpture place. Made with concrete, glass and whatever else.

Ok Steve and I were both amazed that although the towns are small to say the least they did have bars not 1 or 2 but these small towns have 6 or more, WOW. Sorry anyone from here just observing.

Not sure if this is the name of county roads or populations...

So lunch time buddy Tripadvisor help me out. Muddy Waters in Prescott, ok, POP 4227, hummm life. Walked around town found the place has 3 decks outside beautiful day. Perfect. And the view perfect and the food perfect too. Now we are talking.

Oh Yeah for got mention first night this

Plymouth, IL to Trempealeau, Wisconsin

Had to start our day with timing our going thur Chicago not at rush hour. I know in Chicago that time is probably 3 AM but that was not to be. We'll try for 10AM instead. Of course more construction along the way oh here's Chicago hit it at 10AM. The skyline was cool to see and the trip thur was not bad traffic of course but never going thur Chicago we could look at the buildings so that was ok. Sights along the way is always interesting but trying to get them on camera is a whole different story. Miss quite a few. Of course tons of wind tubines. Arriving at our campground. This campground was self checkin and on the Missisippi River right near a dam lock. So for all of you that knew what we did for a living, that was intriring. So we settled in Mulberry Meadows Campground. Sett up camp and off we go to check out the lock and dam. Nice viewing but nothing going on, oh well good place for morning coffee tomorrow. So we headed to somewhere to grab a bite to eat, but where? Tripadvisor will be my second best friend for this trip. Steve will be the first for now, we got a looooong trip, hope to still be by the end. We'll see.

Can you say 4th of July

in Chicago and Wisconsin bound! Still heading in the right direction, GOOD

Chicago Skyline

Yeah on the Missisippi River

stopped in at La Crosse to check it out looking for a place to eat

La Crosse

At La Crosse the 25-foot-tall cement Indian stands with arms crossed. He was unveiled in October 1961, after four years of work by local art teacher Anthony Zimmerhakl. He weighs 20 tons.

PA to Plymouth, IL

After leaving Sandy and Terry's place got on the road about 10:00 am want to get a good day in our next stop on the map was going to be Trempealeau, WI we were schedule to spend a couple of days there and check the area out. Hitting alot of construction along the way certainly makes the day longer. (guess we should get use to it have a long run). We decided  to stop some where before Chicago. Do not feel like doing that at the end of the day. So we found a nice campground in Plymouth, IL. to spend the night.