Tour of Wisconsin

Ah, Wisconsin. My friend. The visit to IL was a trip home, but Wisconsin involved quite a tour, from the Milwaukee area to nearly Minnesota. I have always loved Wisconsin, and spending so much time seeing both the familiar and the new sights really hit home.

I saw Necedah Wildlife Refuge, with bald eagles, great egrets, and sandhill cranes spotted. Tomah with its Ocean Spray plant and the Ho-Chunk Nation of Wisconsin, near Black River Falls. 

All the way, due to poor planning on my part, I was relegated to local radio, but it turned out to be fascinating. Most of my drive to and from Eau Claire I was listening to a show called Central Time, on Wisconsin Public Radio. The only other options were miscellaneous music, which went out of range quickly, but WPR has an overlapping map so I could tune a bit and pick it up again. I heard stories about bees, the bird flu in the chicken flocks in Juneau County, extra-aged cheddar cheese, and discussing how much time the governor spends out of state.

In  the South, you eat catfish and banana pudding. In Wisconsin, you eat walleye and cheese curds.

I see bald eagles, cranes, and egrets in both places, but they simply are more special up north because they are less common. And robins. I have yet to see a robin in Florida, even though I am on the border between the wintering and breeding range. I was so happy to see robins up north. Florida is quite flat (outside of the panhandle) but near the Wisconsin Dells area there are large rock formations along the Wisconsin River.

I'm still adjusting to life in the South, but after 2 1/2 years, I'm not doing it alone. Hopefully I can move forward and not look back quite so much. But in the end, I plan to return to the land of snow and robins.