On our way by 7:30, we breezed through Dubuque, IA, and began a several-day sojourn along the Great River Road. We stopped for a muffin and coffee at Guttenburg, IA, one of many places Susie wants to live in. The semi-restored town features a mile-long park right along the Mississippi, rare for these river towns, a free aquarium of live river fish, and Buzz, the coffee shop where we stopped and where the owner gave Susie a replacement travel mug. We are thankful again for the book Torey gave us, as we never would have found this delightful place.
Somewhere along the rolling hills in eastern Iowa, Bob frolicked in his Field of Dreams, not far from Kevin Costner’s.
We crossed back over the Mississippi at Prairie du Chien, then stopped for lunch at Goose Island County Park, a shady spot along wetlands lining the river. Our tent and ground cloth dried
quickly in the sun and we were on our way. At La Crosse, we picked up some of our favorite beer from 2003, New Glarus Spotted Cow. We needed it later when rain pounded our campsite at Perrot State Park near Trempealeau, WI ($22, including $10 park admission). The park lies right on the river and features steep green hills, called “mountains” here, and wetlands. Our site was very private and surrounded by an unbelievable variety of evergreen and deciduous trees. We stayed out in the rain for quite some time, as the trees barely let the water through, but eventually we had to sit in the car and eat a half-cooked dinner of lentils and rice. The rain extinguished our stove sometime during the cooking process. Earlier I had bemoaned the intense heat and humidity, and the rain did cool things down a bit.
The park had great promise, with many hiking trails and an “exit” on the Great River bike trail. That trail connects with others, including the Elroy-Sparta Trail we biked in 2003, for over 100 miles of uninterrupted bike trail. We rode to its terminus near the river, then around the Trempealeau National Wildlife Refuge. The Refuge was very beautiful and abundant with life, especially deer flies that surrounded our heads as we rode like a hairnet.
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