Above Photo: The Wisconsin Dells

Three years ago I spent a month in Wisconsin, which I affectionately nicknamed “Adult Summer Camp,” land of supper clubs, lakes, Brandy Old Fashioneds, cabins, beer, pontoon boats and tiki bars. I was invited by Rick and Christian, who live in Eau Claire and read about my new life on retrorenovation.com. Fellow RV traveler Kathy joined me, and she and I explored West Central Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Dells, and Milwaukee. It was lovely, but I knew we barely scratched Wisconsin’s surface. I vowed to return someday.

“Someday” came in the form of another invite from Rick and Christian, this time to see the new home they built in Eau Claire, including full hookups! I of course said yes to their generous offer, setting my course to Wisconsin after my niece’s wedding in Oregon in July.

EAU CLAIRE

Rick and Christian have built a dream home in Eau Claire, and the finishing touches were being applied when I arrived in late July.

It was unseasonably hot and humid, but that didn’t stop us from having a good time and catching up with friends old and new for ten days.

Prince’s Pad

One of the biggest items on the itinerary was a tour of Paisley Park Studios, Prince’s home in Chanhassen, Minnesota, just outside Minneapolis. Kathy and I visited the exterior just four short months after he died to see the tributes left by fans, but now the studio is being managed by the company that manages Graceland, and Paisley Park is open for tours.

Rick and I splurged on the longest and most expensive tour option, and by hour three we were regretting it. No photos were allowed inside. There are only so many songs and videos you can listen to and watch when you are supposed to be on a tour, which does not go upstairs to the living quarters; they claim it is because the only route there is the elevator in which he died. I don’t know. You’re raking in the dough. Build some stairs?

I’m really glad we went, and it was cool to see the studios where my favorite Prince songs were created, developed, and recorded, but if you go, take the shorter tour for 100 bucks.

ALONG THE ST. CROIX RIVER

On the border of Wisconsin and Minnesota right by the Twin Cities are two lovely river towns – Hudson, Wisconsin, which I visited last time, and Stillwater, Minnesota. (I know this is a post about Wisconsin and I keep talking about Minnesota, but in this part of the country the two sort of run together.)

Stillwater is one of Minnesota’s oldest towns, founded in 1843. I took the Stillwater Trolley to get my bearings, learning about the logging that created the town, and the lumber barons and their historic mansions.

Even the rooming houses for the loggers now fetch a pretty penny.

Jessica Lange and Sam Shepard raised their kids here. Forbes Magazine named Stillwater one of the Prettiest Small Towns in America, and you can see why.

LA CROSSE

La Crosse, once a fur trading post, is situated on Wisconsin’s western border south of Eau Claire, at the convergence of three rivers: the La Crosse, the Black and the Mississippi.

It is one of 33 historic river towns & villages on Wisconsin’s 250 miles of the Mississippi Great River Road.

Riverside Park has lovely views, riverboat cruises, a museum, and a friendship garden.

THE WISCONSIN NORTHWOODS

My route to the Apostle Islands and Voyageurs National Park took me through Wisconsin’s Northwoods, full of, well, woods – natch, and lakes, legends, cranberry marshes, kitsch, lodges, resorts, scenery and gangster hideouts. As I drove north from Eau Claire, then north, then north some more, the old phrase from medieval maps knocked around in my head: Beyond This Place There Be Dragons!

I stayed on the Lac du Flambeau reservation, right on the lake and just as peaceful and tranquil as you can get. Many campers stay for the season, returning year after year.

The lake got its name from those French Canadian fur traders who saw the Chippewa fishing at night by torchlight.

Nearby Manitowish Waters is a relaxing community with a ten-lake Chain-of-Lakes, shops, bars and restaurants.

There is free music in the park in summertime, and free water shows by the Skiing Skeeters (1954), one of the oldest amateur waterski clubs in the United States.

Even Public Enemies Need A Break

During Prohibition, the lodges and halls Up North were full of booze and gambling. The local law rarely enforced anything, and members of the Chicago mob spent their vacays there.

The Little Bohemia Lodge In Manitowish Waters is the sight of a royally botched 1934 FBI raid where Baby Face Nelson and John Dillinger escaped, and the only one who died was a civilian. The bullet holes are still in the walls and windows.

(They are the real thing, not the ones by Johnny Depp and Christian Bale when they filmed here in 2009.) It also happens to be a great supper club, where you can have dinner on the banks of Little Star Lake.

The local constable, who was riddled with lead but survived, parlayed his $3,500 government settlement into The Cozy Cove, a bar and restaurant just up the road where Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys once played, and home to a Bluegrass festival, in full swing while I was in town.

Minocqua And Woodruff

Nearby Minocqua is a four-season retreat town, where deer roam the streets and you can eat at the 60-year-old Paul Bunyan’s Cook Shanty, complete with Mel-Mac dishes, enamelware coffee mugs, and Thermoware pitchers.

The restaurant with the perpetual line out the door is staffed by fresh-faced high school and college students working their summer jobs.

Little Woodruff, Wisconsin, next door to Minocqua, was the home of country doctor Kate Pelham Newcomb (1886-1956), known as “The Angel on Snowshoes” for her dedication in reaching patients when winter roads were impassable.

It was Dr. Kate’s dream to build a hospital in Woodruff. The penny became the symbol of the project, and local students sought to collect one million of them. When Dr. Kate appeared on an episode of “This Is Your Life,” pennies flooded in from around the world. The Lakeland area got its hospital.

Who Dat? The Hodag!

One day I drove out to Rhinelander to meet its Boogeyman in Residence – The Hodag!

He welcomes you at the Visitor Center, and his likeness is all around downtown.

I lifted this from Explore Rhinelander’s website:

“The first person to spot the Hodag was likely a lumberjack. In the 1800s, Rhinelander was a pioneer lumber town, and loggers who worked the Northwoods told stories of a monster roaming the forests. Legend had it that this “Hodag” was the reincarnated spirit of the sturdy, hardworking oxen that dragged logs from the forest.

However, the Hodag story might even predate the Northwoods logging days. Some historians have suggested that the Hodag strongly resembles pictographs found near Lake Superior that depict Mishipeshu, the Ojibwe water panther.

The Hodag story went viral in 1893 thanks to a Northwoods lumberman and resort owner named Eugene “Gene” Shepard. Shepard was the first to circulate reports of the Hodag, including photographic evidence of the beast. As the story goes, a group of local men used hunting dogs, rifles and squirt guns loaded with “poison water” to attack the Hodag without success before using dynamite to successfully kill the fearsome creature.

Three years later, Shepard came back with an even bigger claim—he said had captured a live Hodag (with the help of some bear wrestlers and a healthy dose of chloroform). He took the captured beast on tour throughout the state, including a stop at the Oneida County Fair, where attendees paid to see the Hodag in person. In darkened tents, amazed onlookers heard the Hodag growl and even saw the creature move.

The story of the Hodag spread quickly into national newspapers. As word spread, a group of scientists from the Smithsonian Institution planned an expedition to Rhinelander to investigate. It was only then that Shepard admitted the Hodag—or at least his version—was a hoax, a creature made of wood and oxen leather that only moved with the help of wires.

So, is that the end of the story?

Maybe not. For decades, golfers around Rhinelander have blamed the Hodag for disappearing golf balls, and anglers have claimed the beast often snatches trophy catches right off their lines.”

THE APOSTLE ISLANDS

Wisconsin has no National Parks, but it has a National Lakeshore – The Apostle Islands, in Northwestern Wisconsin.

No one really knows why they were named the Apostle Islands, an archipelago of 22, not 12, islands in an inland sea – Lake Superior. This is the place for sandstone cliffs, sea caves, rock windows and arches, sea stacks, and beaches. Eighty percent of the national lakeshore is protected as wilderness.

I decided to take my chances and stay at the first-come, first-served Memorial Park in Washburn, on a bluff overlooking Lake Superior.

The sites are electric only, with fresh water and a dump station on the grounds. I arrived on a Tuesday, all but insuring an available spot, but I didn’t realize how lucky I was. Less than ten miles away is a major live music venue, hosting over 60 acts each summer – Big Top Chautauqua.

It just so happened that no concerts were occurring in the few days before or after my arrival. Whew. You do not want to be in the Apostle Islands in summer without a campsite reservation.

Bayfield, year-round population 480, is the jumping off point for the Lakeshore. It is a lovely little seasonal resort town like so many I visit around the United States, which reminds me of Brigadoon, emerging from the fog for only a short time each year.

One evening I attended a free gazebo concert at the lakeside, the local band a quartet of Bayfield schoolteachers.

The best way to see the Apostle Islands is by boat, and I took two of them. This was my first time on Lake Superior.

Lake Superior is the largest lake in the world by surface area. It contains more water than all the other Great Lakes combined. It contains ten percent of all the Earth’s fresh water. There is enough water in the lake to cover all of North and South America in one foot of water. I would soon see it again on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in the fall.

Madeline Island, 2.5 miles across the channel from Bayfield, is the largest of the Apostle Islands and the only one not included in the National Lakeshore. I arrived via adorable car and pedestrian ferry at La Pointe, with a year-round population of 250.

Madeline Island is largely unspoiled. It has a wild, unfinished feeling.

My second foray on the water was an Apostle Islands tour by high-speed boat, where we saw plenty of sandstone formations, sea caves and lighthouses.

Each time the boat slowed down, those of us on deck were swarmed by biting black flies. The little bloodsuckers were undaunted by any insect repellent, and their bites were very painful! When I bitterly mentioned them to the captain he said, “I know those flies are awful, but it’s a good thing they’re here. Their presence indicates a balance in the ecosystem. So just think of them like canaries in a coal mine, except these canaries repeatedly peck you in the face!”

Orchards Galore

The area is full of berry farms and orchards, and I bet as the leaves turn and the temperatures drop, fall harvest in the Apostle Islands would be a lot of fun.

Whitefish

From the Big Lake to your plate in a day, whitefish is ubiquitous on the Lakeshore. I found Lake Superior Whitefish to be rather bland and tasteless, soaking up whatever flavors might be nearby. At Maggie’s in Bayfield, I tried whitefish livers, convincing myself before they were served that beef livers, which I detest, must taste different than fish livers. Um, nope. Same flavor. I tried giving them away to other patrons sitting at the bar, who all politely declined. They were smarter than me. The bartender muttered a few I-told-you-so’s.

(Photo from Bayfield 2019 Travel Guide; I forgot to take a picture!)

STUCK IN LODI AGAIN

Labor Day weekend was fast approaching, but I had not made camping reservations anywhere – a foolish and/or gutsy move for a full-timer. I would be en route to Door County in Northeast Wisconsin, so I set my sights on a somewhat central Wisconsin location to do four things: 1) See the State Capitol in Madison; 2) Tour The House on the Rock In Spring Green; 3) Dine at Wisconsin’s most celebrated Supper Club; and 4) Take a boat tour of the Wisconsin Dells.

I was quite surprised to get a site at a lakeside campground in Lodi, Wisconsin so soon before America’s biggest camping three-day weekend, but not that surprised when I arrived. Last winter, when Crystal Lake was frozen, it was covered in record snowfall. Come spring, the whole thing thawed, and it wouldn’t stop raining. They lost over 100 mobile homes and RVs in the floods, and they were still cleaning it all up. My spot overlooked the tool shed and work barn, land moving equipment and porta-potties. I know Fogerty and CCR were singing about a town in California, but I couldn’t help but hum them all weekend.

Crystal Lake met my expectations in one way: It was a 30-minute drive in any direction to everything I wanted to see.

Madison

In Madison, I saw the State Capitol, the Saturday Dane County Farmers’ Market (the largest producer-only market in the country), and the Taste of Madison in one fell swoop, as it was all on the Capitol Complex on the same day.

I jumped into the crowd, which traditionally moves counter-clockwise, en masse, around the square to peruse the stands.

In the Capitol Building, there were no metal detectors at any of the entrances. How very egalitarian of them, but I wonder, does that change when lawmakers are present? It seems rather foolhardy to me.

The House On The Rock

Three years ago, Rick, Kathy and I drove to Spring Green to see Taliesin, Frank Lloyd Wright’s summer home. We saw signs for the nearby House on the Rock and I Googled it, dismissing it as a tourist trap. I thought very little else about it until this year, when I watched the Starz series “American Gods.“ Based on a series of novels by the same name, it follows the lives of deities brought to America by slaves and immigrants, who in the present day are no longer revered and work dreary day jobs. One of the gods, a brilliant Ian McShane in the series, rallies the old gods together to fight a war against the new gods, like Media and Internet. Where do they hold their rally?

The House on the Rock. Specifically, the carousel at the House on the Rock.

Interest sufficiently piqued, I picked the Wednesday before Labor Day to see it. What a perfect day to do so. I practically had the place to myself.

How does one describe a place like the House on the Rock? It all started with a trustafarian named Alex, who built a house he never lived in on top of massive boulders.

One part of the house, the Infinity Room, is cantilevered over the forest canopy below.

It is a stunning, albeit frightening, piece of work.

Oh, the irony that the House on the Rock is less than ten miles from Taliesin. On one hand, one of the most celebrated architectural masterpieces in the country. The other? Well…

A stream runs through the house, and most of it is carpeted, including the walls and ceilings, which makes for a very musty odor after several decades.

The house is circuitous and muti-leveled, returning you to rooms you’ve already seen, and wayfinding signage is awful.

Alex liked stained glass.

Alex liked musical contraptions. Alex liked armor. Oh, hell. There isn’t anything Alex didn’t like.

He was a tinkerer, extremely creative, probably a little mad, and had two things in abundance: money, and time.

The house was not enough to quench his thirst for creativity, so he started filling warehouse-sized outbuildings on the property with collections and fanciful creations. The first building houses a complete replica of a Victorian town, and so many mechanical musical machines, many filling entire rooms, that it is mind-boggling.

The second building is nautically themed, with a gargantuan sea creature battling a giant squid in the center.

There are cases and cases of scrimshaw.

Right before entering the third building, you see the carousel. It is truly something to behold.

It is the world’s largest carousel, with 269 carousel animals (none of them horses), 182 chandeliers, and over 20,000 lights. In typical madman misanthrope fashion, no one gets to ride it.

By the time you enter the third building (through the mouth of a demon, no less), the mishmash of red bulbs and timpani drums and cauldrons and boilers begins to impress upon you just how crazy this man was. Your feet are tired, you feel like a mole stumbling through dark spaces, your nostrils are on fire from the smell of mold and mildew, you haven’t seen an exit sign in hours (where are those shortcut signs like in IKEA?), and the walls start to close in. Then you reach the cases of miniature dollhouses and circuses. Thousands of them. I was at a full sprint for the exit by this time.

My mind was boggled by the sheer volume of collections housed at the House on the Rock. I inquired of their value to an employee, who merely shrugged his shoulders. By the way, the whole place is woefully understaffed, there are no guided tours, and nobody seems to know anything useful.

Perhaps the reason I was shrugged off is because most of the items at House on the Rock are fake. House on the Rock is one of the biggest frauds ever perpetuated on the touring and sightseeing public. What Alex couldn’t buy, he made, or more accurately, had made. There is a whole section of alleged crown jewels of Europe, but if you look at them closely, they are made of paste and cardboard. Almost all the munitions and armor were manufactured on site. The musical contraptions move, and some of the instruments really “play,” but most of the sounds are recorded.

The most impressive piece, the carousel, isn’t even real. It turns on rollers because it was too heavy to turn on a central axle, the way carousels do.

“American Gods” author Neil Gaiman claims he toned down some aspects of the House on the Rock in the novel “in order to make it believable.” I get it now.

A Perfect Day For The Dells

It was End of Season when Kathy and I drove through the Wisconsin Dells three years ago. Many of the businesses were already closed, including the boat tours, and we went searching (mostly) in vain for history and authenticity. We left with the worst sort of “tourist trap” impression, which we would feel again in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee in the Great Smoky Mountains.

I knew the Dells became a tourist destination due to the efforts of a nature lover and photographer, and I wanted to return to hear his story and to see the Dells through his eyes. I wasn’t disappointed when I took the Upper Dells Tour with Dells Boat Tours.

Henry Hamilton Bennett loved the Dells and popularized them through his photographs in the late 1800s. His images were viewed through three-dimensional stereoscopes, a novelty found in most Victorian parlors of the day.

Bennett’s greatest accomplishment was the invention of the instant shutter. When he showed his stop action photographs to people, they accused him of fraud, so Bennett set out to capture an image that no one could accuse of being fake.

At Stand Rock, Bennett satisfied his skeptics by photographing his son Ashley leaping across a five-foot chasm. It took 17 takes! The photograph won first prize in an 1895 national photo contest held in New York.

We disembarked the boat two times, first at Witch’s Gulch,

and again at Stand Rock.

To commemorate Ashley‘s historical jump, the tour boat company now employs German Shepherds to demonstrate the leap. While I found the whole thing a bit odd and unnecessary, the animal lover in me was relieved to see safety netting below, and the chasm shortened by a piece of plywood.

Apparently our performer was in training and a little nervous. She made the jumps both ways for us, but she refused to do it for the prior group. I don’t blame her!

Ishnala Supper Club

Wisconsin is known for its supper clubs, and I went to as many as I could, but after my boat tour of the Dells I drove 15 minutes to the greatest supper club in Wisconsin: Ishnala. Ishnala is consistently voted number one in Wisconsin. It was featured in the documentary televised on PBS, and it is on the cover of the book dedicated to Wisconsin supper clubs.

In its 66th year on Mirror Lake, Ishnala is Winnebago for “By Itself Alone,” and it’s a fitting description. It has all the things that appeal to me in a restaurant – history,

location,

decor,

great ambiance, even better food, beautiful cocktails,

attention to detail, and impeccable service. Since Rick couldn’t make the drive down to join me, I dined alone, opting to have an appetizer and one cocktail in one bar,

then another appetizer and cocktail in another (there are three bars!).

Topping off the evening was a T-shirt just made for me in the gift shop.

Wollersheim Winery

Ishnala makes Brandy Old Fashioneds and “Wiscollinses” (their version of a Tom Collins) exclusively with Wollersheim Brandy and Gin. Somehow I already knew that name, and it dawned on me, it was a five-minute drive from the campground. Score one for the sad little RV resort!

I spent a sunny Sunday afternoon wine and spirits tasting and came away with some adult beverage treasures.

DOOR COUNTY

I’m so glad I finished my second trip to Wisconsin in Door County, as it quickly became one of my favorite places on the planet, and I made such fond memories there. To make it even more special, Margaret, whom I finally met in person in the Amana Colonies, Iowa, was in Door County taking art classes while I was there, and we were able to do some evening activities together. I will go back, perhaps even for a whole summer and into the fall.

Looking at the Wisconsin map, Door County is the little finger of a peninsula that juts out from the eastern side. It’s 80 miles long and 25 miles wide, with Green Bay to the west, and Lake Michigan to the east. The City of Green Bay is 40 miles south.

Wee towns and villages dot the peninsula, some on the Bay side, some on “The Quiet Side” (Lake Michigan), each with its own personality, amenities, and attractions.

Sturgeon Bay

I stayed in Sturgeon Bay, population 10,000, the largest and more blue-collar of the towns, home to shipbuilders and others maritime trades. Over one third of the entire Door County population lives in Sturgeon Bay.

Sturgeon Bay became the epicenter of Door County maritime traffic when a canal was dug in the 1870s between Green Bay and Lake Michigan. Before that, the only way to circumnavigate the peninsula was at the northern end, through Death’s Door. (More on that in a little bit.) The Sturgeon Bay Ship Canal and North Pierhead Lighthouses are wonderfully accessible on foot.

(Many Door County lighthouses can only be seen from the water.)

Sturgeon Bay has an adorable Door County History Museum, including an exhibit on Door County cherries.

The public library has a real gem in the Miller Art Museum, showcasing local artists and subject matter.

In retrospect I would rather have stayed in the Egg Harbor/ Fish Creek area, 35 miles north, the center of activity for art and the arts, with restaurants, supper clubs, and shops. I did an awful lot of driving, and it’s especially dark driving at night. (If you are in the area and want to take my advice, camp at Peninsula State Park instead of Potawatomi State Park. Along with a more central location, the bluffs at Peninsula State Park provide a beautiful view of Green Bay and the Strawberry Islands, and there is a renowned golf course.)

I loved exploring the villages on The Bay Side. Ellison Bay, one of the smallest, is home to a cidery and was so picturesque.

Ephraim

Ephraim, settled by Norwegian Moravians in 1853, is rich in history.

(Moravian Church)

(Old Schoolhouse)

Here’s an interesting fact: Ephraim was dry until 2016. You still cannot get a mixed drink there – beer and wine only.

Mariners have been scrawling graffiti at Anderson Dock since the early 1900s, and tourists have picked up where the sailors left off.

In Ephraim Margaret and I experienced a traditional Door County Fish Boil. Water, salt, and onions are placed in a pot over a wood flame. A little while later, potatoes are added. Lake Michigan Whitefish goes in last.

After a good boil, kerosene is thrown on the flames to engulf the pot, burning off the fish oil and scum from the top of the water.

When it boils over, it’s ready.

Smother everything in butter and it’s a very tasty meal! I found Lake Michigan whitefish to be far more flavorful than Lake Superior whitefish, but perhaps it was the way it was prepared.

Egg Harbor

Egg Harbor got its name when, I kid you not, two ships tried to enter the harbor at the same time, setting off a skirmish involving the throwing of raw eggs at each other. It was in Egg Harbor that Margaret and I began our Wisconsin Supper Clubs Tour with the Door County Trolley Company,

including cocktails at Maxwelton Braes Lodge (1929) in Bailey’s Harbor;

prime rib at The English Inn (1969) in Fish Creek;

and Grasshoppers and Brandy Alexanders at the Carrington Pub & Grill In Egg Harbor.

Fish Creek has a charming downtown

and is home to the Peninsula Players Theater, the oldest summer residential theater in the United States.

Margaret and I took in a play, followed by a bonfire in the forest by the water on the playhouse grounds, complete with strings of cafe lights and a cocktail bar.

Adult Summer Camp indeed. Before the play, we had dinner at the Greenwood Supper Club (1929) in Fish Creek. I love a printed paper placemat! I was in supper club heaven.

Port Des Morts And Washington Island

There is a strait near the northern end of Door County – a six-mile wide narrow passageway between Green Bay and Lake Michigan. The treacherous waters were well-known to the Native Americans, who sailed in birchbark canoes. They told stories of a night when rivaling tribes entered opposite ends of the strait to attack one another, never to be seen again. The French Voyageurs who traded with them called the strait “Port Des Morts” and the name stuck, eventually translating in English to “Death’s Door.“ The passage claimed 24 sailing vessels between 1837 and 1914 and nearly 40 in the nearby waters in the same period.

Washington Island (named after a schooner that anchored there in 1816), still a part of Door County, is on the northern side of Death’s Door, and a short ferry ride from Gill’s Rock will take you there.

(Another short ferry ride will take you from Jackson Harbor on Washington Island to Rock Island State Park, the northernmost part of Door County.)

By the way, here is a photo of the road that leads to the ferry landing in Gill’s Rock. I wish I could say I took it, but it’s from Peter Patau on Flickr; mine didn’t come out as well. No one knows exactly why the road was constructed with the serpentine curves at the end, other than aesthetics. That’s part of the fun of Door County.

The Scandinavian roots of Washington Island (pop. 710, 35 square miles) are evident.

In 1870, four bachelors from Iceland moved to Washington Island, and thus began the second oldest Icelandic settlement in North America. Early settlers were primarily fisherman, but new arrivals came from Norway, Sweden, and Denmark with new trades, including farming and logging.

Here’s some cement work at the ferry landing on Washington Island. Perhaps the same guys who constructed the road poured this concrete! I love beauty for nothing more than beauty’s sake.

The Stavkirke, or Stave Church, was patterned from an ancient church style common in medieval Norway. Only 33 of the more than 1,000 stave churches in Norway still exist. The islanders all pitched in to build this one.

Schoolhouse Beach on Washington Island is one of five beaches in the world with perfectly smooth stones.

The Bitter End

There’s something done on Washington Island I dare say does not occur anywhere else in the world. At Nelson’s Hall, Bitters Pub and Restaurant (1899) patrons down shots of Angostura Bitters.

It all started during Prohibition, when the proprietor obtained a pharmacy license and claimed that 90 proof Angostura Bitters was a medicinal treatment. Nowadays, you can take a shot and earn your membership in the Bitters Club, complete with membership card stained with the Bitters drops from the bottom of the shot glass.

A few years ago, there was a worldwide shortage of Angostura Bitters. I asked the bartender how a bar on an island with the largest per capita consumption of Bitters got by. Two employees traveled through Missouri, buying up as many bottles as they could find. I chuckled at the thought of those Philistines in Missouri not using Bitters.

Bailey’s Harbor

On the Lake Michigan side, I loved Bailey’s Harbor. It is home to several lighthouses, including the Cana Island Lighthouse (1870).

In the old days people walked across a rock causeway to the island, but in the last five years Lake Michigan has continued to rise. Now the very bumpy trip is made in a cart towed by a tractor!

There’s something you don’t see every day. I told them they need to invest in one of those swamp buggies like they use in the Everglades.

It was in Bailey’s Harbor that I first learned about range lights. The Bailey’s Harbor Range Lights were built in 1869 and consist of an Upper Range Light, with the lighthouse keeper’s quarters,

and a lower range light.

Mariners would line up the white light of the Upper Range light with the red light of the Lower Range Light to avoid the rocky shores.

The range lights helped make Bailey’s Harbor the only harbor of safe refuge north of Milwaukee, that is, until Sturgeon Bay dug the canal. Mariners no longer had to circumnavigate Door County after that.

After construction of the range lights, the waters of Lake Michigan receded. The area that remains, known as The Ridges Sanctuary, is now a 1,000 acre boreal forest with elevated boardwalks and trails.

Good thing the people revolted in the 1930s when the city planned to turn that area into a trailer park.

I simply cannot wait until I get the chance to return to Door County. I was there at End of Season and may find my patience tested by the summer crowds, but I think I will love it just the same.

In a county called Door, my time in Wisconsin came to a close. Get it? Closed Door! Thanks for everything, Wisconsin. I’ll be back!