Rolling again

Evening, Campers! It's Silver Cliche' here with you again tonight. And I'm delighted to report our location is somewhere other than St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin. Sadly, it's not St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands, but we are at Lake Kegonsa State Park just outside of Madison, Wisconsin in the south central part of the state.

The morning broke today in St. Croix Falls right where it left off last night... 45 degrees and drizzling. We had made the commitment to leave this morning in part because we had moved all of the fresh water in the trailer into one or the other of the two "not so fresh" tanks (enough said) and we had to move the trailer to address that. As long as we were hitching up we figured we might as well get started on the next phase of our journey.

So we headed east then south rolling across Wisconsin. We passed by or through towns and cities you may actually have heard of (and a bunch I'd bet you have not). I'm thinking of places like Eau Claire, Chippewa Falls, the Wisconsin Dells and ultimately the state capital, Madison. Today is our 4th day in Wisconsin. It has rained every day we have been here. Looking at the weather channel forecast for Mackinac Island, Michigan (which was a destination that is basically the reason we entered this hell hole of a state in the first place) it showed today was rainy and 47. Tomorrow is forecast to be rainy and 52, Tuesday will be rainy and 56 and Wednesday will be rainy and 57. I'm sensing that the way one tells its spring in Wisconsin and Michigan is that the rain you are feeling from head to foot becomes warmer.

If you've read about our adventures before you probably realize that wherever we visit I like to immerse myself in the local food, history, geography and customs. Being here in Wisconsin and experiencing spring as the locals do I got to thinking... I bet this dismal environment appears through the subconscious of denizens of "the Badger State" in ways even they don't understand or appreciate... maybe I can find some and enlighten them. I had this realization when three days of captivity in a small metal box with the constant sound of rain on the metal roof had started to take their toll. I began to feel deeper sympathy for Noah from the Old Testament. While the Bible highlighted the best of his accomplishments, I can't help but imagine when it was over he said to himself "There's 40 days of my life I'll never get back.".  It occurred to me that even the state nickname "the Badger State" might be one of those cultural expressions emerging from the effects of the climate. I always thought it referred to the fighting spirit of the member of the weasel family that the University adopted as it's mascot. Now I'm thinking it is a byproduct of confinement of groups of people indoors for long periods of time. Or, let's take the state song... "On Wisconsin". I'm thinking it was originally "On from Wisconsin" and was a wishful lament of an early pioneer. When I actually listened to it, I realized it's a more modern tune but it was clearly written to a beat formed by windshield wipers set to their high speed. When a place like this gets into your psyche it comes out in unexpected ways... but it comes out.

So we drove through the very heart of Wisconsin. Clearly this is an agricultural wonderland. It's evident that agriculture here is a different thing than where we have been in the earlier parts of this trip. For example, the fields are smaller than in Nebraska or Iowa. In many areas they are tucked into dales, wrapped around hills and set in tiers on gentle slopes. The tractors, plows and combines at the ever-present John Deere (the green equipment with the yellow trim) and Case/IH (the dark red with black) dealers are just a tad smaller here. I didn't see a Quad Trac tractor all day. It's also evident that the cattle we saw were less often for beef and more often for dairy. Remember, this is the state where people wear hats that look like wedges of cheese. Occasionally we saw industry that was unlike anything we've seen before. Here are a couple of pics of these facilities:

At first I thought these were ethanol production plants. The buildings were belching steam and the piles of bulk material outside looked like wheat or other grains. You know about the US ethanol business... right? That's where we take food that we used to sell cheaply to poor countries like Haiti and at the mandate of the US Federal Government we turn it into motor fuel and burn it. That process lets environmentalists feel good that we are growing motor fuel rather than burning dinosaur squeezings and it helps farm state Senators get reelected while causing food prices to go up for poor families in other countries that most American environmentalists and Senators don't give a crap about (unless rising sea levels threaten their hovels... in which case we make a documentary about them to show to rich people at Davos). Anyway... it wasn't that after all. Central Wisconsin is one of only a few places that mine, dry and distribute silica sand. What's silica sand used for, you ask? Fracking. Yep... far from being a source of carbon-neutral motor fuel, these businesses prepare and ship very specialized sand that is forced down wells all over the US to drive out natural gas. That natural gas is in turn used to make electricity that California environmentalists buy to charge their Teslas. The hypocrisy is evidently lost on everyone in California when they tell their friends over a glass of Pino Griggio "I drove a zero emission car to the party!" "Ooooooo... how responsible of you!" the friends reply. The people of Central Wisconsin clearly need and appreciate the work. They don't seem to mind the hypocrisy.

So we bounced along for most of the afternoon. I'm sure the highways were mostly built by students of the engineers who misaligned the slabs of I-20 in Louisiana. We rocked and rolled from Eau Claire to Madison. Mrs. C' was trying to type something and uttered several oaths at the Department of Transportation officials whose concrete caused her to mistype every third keystroke. As we got closer to the campground we shifted to state highways. Fortunately, they were asphalt, not concrete slabs. Unfortunately they had been repaired so many times that they looked like Dolly Parton's childhood coat (except we couldn't feel the love each road crew placed in every patch).

But we made it! Now one day's travel removed from St. Croix Falls. Two day's away from Buffalo with stops planned at state parks in Indiana tomorrow night and Ohio on Tuesday. It was 52 and cloudy here when we parked the rig. After several day's of low to mid 40s and rain, 52 and overcast looks and feels wonderful. 

I'm hoping one day to have both subject matter and lighting to take real pictures again. We seem a baby step closer today since we have now gone 6 hours without being rained on. Maybe tomorrow we can shoot for a full day.

Until then...

SC'