Strictly considered from a road surface-shoulder quality-traffic density perspective, Wisconsin’s county road system (bewildering as its orthographic labeling is) nicely complements the state’s bike trails and makes for a peerless overall network. Throw in the general flatness and gentle hills amid dairy farms and corn fields and you have a Rockwellian vision of what an urban person thinks the countryside looks like.

We started our day by feasting on the “Fat Boy” (TM?) Michigan blueberries we got at Brennan’s.

Though at one point we were swarmed by an angry buzz of climate-changing cyclists, for the most part the roads looked like this:


At our first stop of the day, we met Raleigh:

whose owner, Dan, somewhat ruefully admitted that his wife had named their dog after the North Carolina city rather than his preference, the pitcher Rollie Fingers.

Dan also told us that the cream-colored brick in abundance around us is locally known as Watertown brick (after the nearby town). Evidently the high lime and sulfur content of the clay partially accounts for its color.



After more roads like this:

with the occasional milk truck for company:

we got into Juneau, a short nine miles from our day’s destination. Much of the town was engaged in a vast recycling project called a rummage sale. I’m not sure how the town divided up the roles but seemingly half the populace had gently used items on display for the other half (as well as day trippers from around the area). But being on bikes, this was the sign that caught our attention:

Clearly, there was only one thing to do:

We ended up spending a delightful half hour or so chatting with some very friendly and welcoming locals. It’s a big part of what I like about the whole self-supported multi-day bike ride thing. As fractious as our country is, which I don’t necessarily think is a bad thing – people strongly disagree about things that are important to them – though clearly we’re heading for an historical shakeout/realignment, it’s still a good thing to be able to drop in on strangers and share a meal and some conversation. So thanks Lisa – we enjoyed talking with you and though we did not end up going to Culvers in Beaver Dam (see below), we did have some wonderful frozen custard in Ripon the next day.

The odds are good that I will do an insightful post/crazy rant about the economic logistics of credit card touring through small towns but for now these contrasting photos will have to do. We rolled up into Beaver Dam on the west side, where we saw this:


But that is not the part of town where we stayed; instead we were at the ass end of Beaver Dam, which looks like this:

and the local store sells this:

My country tis of thee.