Wisconsin, I so love you, but you need to start being more honest with me. No more of this showing me something amazing only to rip it away and then kick me in the balls. That's not just how to make friends.
I did 96 miles today with 6:18 on bike and arrived to town at 5:15pm. That arrival time isn't bad, but it's a few hours later than I'd like to be arriving. The mileage is.. well... I had figured it to be 80 miles on my stupid map, not 96. Even when I was in Gresham, at mile 60, I had figured it was between 25 and 30 miles away. Not 45 miles. I even asked several locals "Hey Suring is about 30 miles away, right?" They all said "Ya" in their Northern Wisconsin accents, which I now realized means "hell if I know, I drive a car, hippie."
Anyway, now I'm cooking dinner in nice park in Suring (pop ~500) hoping I don't get hassled later because I couldn't find anyone to ask if I could stay here. It's pretty out of the way though so I should be OK. This is the first time I've been back on my "regular routine" since the park in Corsica, SD with the kids in the pool, and before that the park in Interior that I took a picture of the day before my bike weld broke. I guess "regular" isn't the best way to describe anything anymore.
Touring in Wisconsin is weird. First of all, even though I'm in a town of only 500 I'm still in populous area with lots of towns of several hundred people around so the locals are still kind of weird and wary. I'm starting to get that "you are nearing the Eastern US and everyone is afraid of everyone" poison. That's part of why I'm worried about being hassled tonight if I don't get a chance to check in with the Sheriff.
It's also different than touring in other midwestern places like Iowa, Indiana, Illinoise, and Ohio. It's more like Pennsylvania (this keyboard disables my spell check.) In Wisc even towns of almost a thousand may lack a grocery store in gas station, making resupplying and water unpredicable. Out west towns with stuff are rare, but they are predicable. In the lower Midwest every town has a gas station at least, usually Casey's. Around here all the locals go to X town for stuff, that looks just like every other town, and I sure as hell don't know which one it is. "Thank you Mario, but your Chocolate Milk is in another castle..."
So lets talk about the 'ol Wisconsin Bait 'n Switch. We already experienced this with the nice township roads that turn into gravel without any escape. I've learned my lesson, they aren't luring me anymore with their siren song. But Wisconsin adapts!
Their maps are one example. Most states have a free bike map that covers the entire state. Wisconsin has a set of large very detailed maps that you have to pay for. The detail is worthless, because all it adds are the siren township roads and then doesn't differentiate between gravel and paved. All I can ride on are the lettered county roads that fit fine on a full-size map. Also, to use their maps to ride across Wisc you'd need something like 5 of them, taking up a third of your pannier and not fitting in your handlebar bag. Worthless! Why even bother making them? The maps doing even have mileages! None of their stupid maps do. What is the point of a map without mileages? That damn things are even too rough to use as toilet paper in a pinch.
That's a minor example though. Today Wisc got me good with one of it's Rails to Trails trails. Rails to Trails are old railroad tracks turned to bike trails, like the one with the tunnels I did a few days ago. Today my route had planned 24 miles of such a trail, but I had bailouts planned and intersections long the way in case it got rough. Also, I don't really like traveling on crushed limestone because it slows my speed by about 4 mph but it was the shortest and flattest route. My plan was to get to the intersecting town (Hatley, about 30 miles out) see if it looks good, and then decide.
Well it looked great so I went. I stayed good long enough for me to get beyond my first few bailout points (3 miles) and then it turned to poop sticks. It became a double track trail (think truck ruts but a bit smoother) with me jumping back and forth between the two tracks trying to find a smooth route. Luckily it was recently mowed, but I was still in lots of tall grass and my tires were kicking up who knows how many ticks and rabid bats and Lime's Disease all over my legs. I was stuck on this BS for 8 miles until my next bailout spot. DAMN YOU WISCONSIN! YOU TRICKED ME AGAIN!
Anyway, I do love it here. The rest of the ride was beautiful through rolling hills and mostly uneventful. It was overcast and about 70 deg and a bit muggy. My rest day in Wellingville was great and I went to lake and ate pizza and beer. Carol cooked me awesome breakfast this morning . I did the last 40 miles powered almost entirely by a cookie dough blizzard (but generic, no towns big enough for a DQ here). All's good in Suring tonight (assuming I hide well enough).
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