Day 56 – Aug, 7, 2015 – Reedsburg WI – Waupun WI 70 mils

Day 56 – Aug 7, 2015 – Reedsburg WI – Waupun WI – 70 miles

Audrey –

Where in the world are we? We have asked that many times. In ND we seemed so very far from everything yet today seemed almost the same. Here there are more farms, so probably more people. Yet, we rarely see people on the road. We know they are there, they pass us in their cars. Well, we do see people on lawnmowers, yep we see lawnmower people, that’s about it.

But today we had a very special experience. We rode and rode 50 miles on country roads with very few cars. It was rolling hills which are sometimes steep. At one corner we looked ahead and low and behold, a horse and buggy, we were in Amish country. It was really cool to see this world, the perfectly kept farms, the huge draft horses, the hand cut wheat fields, the young women hanging their laundry to dry. It was all so very foreign to us. I will admit that I have some experience with Amish and Pennsylvania Dutch since my father and grandparents were from there. But Gregg was very impressed.

At one point a young boy of 11 yrs old came to a dramatic stop with his two draft horse (Clydesdale like horses) just in front of us. It seemed that the 2 horse saw home, the farm across the road, and wanted to get back as fast as they could. The boy gave it his best to hold them back, which did happen for a moment, and then the horses took over and pulled the buggy home without hesitation. The interesting thing about the whole event is that though the child somehow had difficulty with these huge horses, he did not once show and sense of it on his face. “No Fear” got a new meaning just then. As Gregg said, just after the incident, “beats skateboarding”!

Our cultural tour was the highlight of the day along with our animal sightings. We saw cranes, deer, flying geese, a farm of peacocks and ducks and chickens and goats and pigs. It was a real treat. I liked it so much better than the monotonous straight aways of the bike paths that hid the scenery behind a wall of trees and forests.

But the low point was our 3 hr morning ride through torrential rain storms. Just shortly after we started, maybe at mile 8 we hit a storm. It rained heavily. We had prepared by covering our gear, but it was bad. It wasn’t too cold. At mile 30 when we his Portage WI, the streets were streaming with torrents of water. It was bad. I could hardly see out of my glasses. It was a combination of too much rain and my body heat fogging them up. We finally got into town in time for lunch. We went to a Bar and Grill for a burger and the indoor temperature hit us like a wall of arctic air. We were soaking wet, and the last thing we wanted was an air conditioned “deep freezer”. We were trying to figure out why they over AC places here? Hummm?

We froze for an hour and continued on. The rest of the day was dry. We settle tonight in the Downtown Inn Motel in Waupun. I have to say it is getting pretty exhausting. It is a long long trip. We need to get to Manitowoc for the ferry across Lake Michigan. We may make it tomorrow to somewhere close in order to catch the ferry then next day. Wish us luck.
My water logged shoes and feet need to dry first.