Day 207: Connecting Route, Portage County

Day 207: Monday, July 4th, 2022

Total Miles hiked for the day: 5.6; Net Miles 0.0 

We are like horses to the barn. 

Have you ever gone out on a trail ride? You know, when they take a bunch of people who don't know halter from harness, put them on top of weary nags, then lead them out nose to tail on well-worn trails for their very own 'Wild West Adventure'? 

Well, I've done a few of those, and you can tell from my description that I don't really think of that as 'horseback riding'. It's not fun for the horses, it's not fun for the guides, and it can be dangerous to the riders, too. I was on a trail ride once where - never mind, wrong story. 

I don't want to give the wrong impression. I'm not some born-in-the-saddle cowboy, and I actually don't know anything about equestrian tack, but both Theresa and I have had the opportunity to ride horses independent of the guided tour and it's a lot more fun than the typical trail ride. 

But - back to my original metaphor. When out on those trail rides, those horses know the drill. They've done this a thousand times, and they are bored. Taking people for a walk is a job for them which they do only because they feel like they have to. And on the way out they will plod along, slow and lethargic, acting as though they barely have enough energy to make it around the bend, let alone up a hill. 

Then they reach that magic spot along the ride. The turn-around. The point where they know they are headed home. They will become more lively. Their noses come up. The ears are more alert and searching. A good guide will make sure that the return trip is carefully measured. They will walk slowly, trying to keep the mares (for they are nearly always mares) from trotting. Trotting is the worst. An inexperienced rider will bounce along like a child on their grandfather's knee. So walking is key, but the horses get fidgety. And there is always that point where the end is within sight or smell, and trail horses lose all patience. When they know they are headed to the barn they will pace forward relentlessly, ignoring the feeble tugs on the reigns of the novice riders, and move with an energy they seemed incapable of only fifteen minutes before. Nothing will get in their way. The end is in sight and they want this to be done with.  

That's us.  

Location 1: The portion of the connecting route north of the New Hope Iola Ski Hill Segment from the trailhead to the Lions Lake Camp on County A. 
5.6 Miles of trail covered

It is the Fourth of July. I like that holiday. It's one of the few that don't really come with universal expectations. It may be traditional to get together for picnics and fireworks, but it's socially acceptable if you're not always there. There's no gift-giving involved. No pressure. You don't have to dress up for it. Relaxed. My kind of holiday. 

We have gotten to the point now where everything can be counted. Six maps. Three counties. Two Segments. 25.7 miles. Five total hikes if you count the last one in September. This is all feeling, if not effortless, very, very doable. Relaxed. My kind of hiking. 

Ignoring the fact that we deliberately left 1.7 miles in Door County to hike on our final event in September, we only had two counties to tackle. Marathon County, in which we lived, and Portage County, just to the south. As we have been doing for weeks, we headed to the farthest end and started walking home. 

Today was a crisscross hike, one vehicle, and Theresa dropped me off at the north trailhead for New Hope-Iola. I got a nice picture of us at the start. It was 10:45 am and the temperature was a comfortable 73 degrees. It would never get warmer all day. 

I started walking right away, but rather than immediately driving to her launching point, Theresa stopped to place snail patches on the vehicles parked at the trailhead. They were clearly on the IAT - there is no other reason for a car to be parked out here. 

We know that the patches were found, because we heard from at least one person later who discovered it when they turned their windshield wipers on and something was wedged under them, leaving a streaky mess instead of wiping the glass clean. Whoops. 

So I started out by taking my snails-eye-view picture down the road. No paint, no shoulder, no traffic. Just me and the road.

Random Road Hiking Thought #1. 250 miles of connecting route have convinced me I'm in the movie Groundhog's Day.

Random Road Hiking Thought #2. I kind of wish I had a rusty old truck from the 19-somethings rotting away in my front yard.

I could do without the tires and tarp, but the old truck frame is kinda cool. Seriously. Wooden-spoked wheels? What am I looking at here?

Random Road Hiking Thought #3. At 246 years old, America is still quite young compared to Great Britain. We have essentially reached the adolescent stage where we're doing stupid stuff we'll regret later.

Sunset road is a little bumpity, but not what you'd call hilly. And there is beautiful wooded scenery to both sides. This is an ideal place for birding, and behold, at the north end of the road where it crosses Flume Road and continues on County T stands the Burdette and Sarah Eagon Nature Education Preserve. It's a 15-acre preserve owned by the University of Wisconsin system that is open to the public year-round.

The property is being actively managed for grouse and woodcock habitat, which means yearly efforts are made to promote native species and eliminate invaders like poison ivy, buckthorn, honeysuckle, prickly ash and spotted knapweed. You can read more about it on their UWSP webpage.

Random Road Hiking Thought #4. I get a sense of wrongness every time I pass a stream that's flowing north.

We live in a state where virtually all water flows generally north to south. That's because most of the state's waters escape through the Wisconsin and then the Mississippi River watershed. This is obviously not true of every single stream, since all hills have two sides, and water has to go downhill, even if that's in a northerly direction. Even knowing this, it still seems strange to me to see anything larger than a tiny creek flowing to the north.

I am learning something about photography. Sometime the difference between a good photo and a great photo is just zooming in a little. Here is a beetle on a milkweed flower.

Same photo, enlarged.

Random Road Hiking Thought #5. Just once I'd like to see an aluminum can or vaping pen come flying back out of the ditch at the car that threw it. We need a magic spell. Maybe JK Rowling can come up with something.

Here's another zoomed in shot of this guy.

Random Road Hiking Thought #6. I think a walking stick made out of hornbeam would be awesome, but I can't bring myself to cut down a young tree to make it happen.

Hornbeam is also called musclewood. It's that tree that looks like it's on a serious fitness regimen, with tight skin covering its rippling muscles. It's an interesting look. But why would I cut one down just so I can drag its carcass through the woods with me? This next image isn't my photo, but it shows what I'm talking about.

Flume Creek flowed west to east. Not a true violation of normal, but if you follow it east it bends around and dumps into the Little Wolf River, which makes its way to the Wolf River, Lake Winneconne, Lake Butte des Morts, and Lake Winnebago. This then outflows along the Fox River in a northbound direction to dump into Green Bay, which in turn empties into Lake Michigan and thus escapes the continent by flowing north into Lake Huron, Erie, Ontario, and out the Saint Lawrence Seaway to the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and thence the Atlantic Ocean.

Not one mention is made of the Wisconsin River. It does not go to the Mississippi River or the Gulf of Mexico. It goes north, not south, and that's just plain weird.

In fact, if you study the course of this connecting route, and the segments and connecting routes leading north to Kettlebowl you will realize that you are not only walking along the edge of the Green Bay Lobe from the Laurentide Ice Sheet, but actually along a continental divide. All water on one side of the divide goes in one direction (to the Gulf of Mexico), and all water on the other side of the divide goes a different direction (to the Gulf of Saint Lawrence). It's not as sexy as the Rocky Mountains, but it's a very real place and when you walk through this region you are walking on its crest.

Random Road Hiking Thought #7. The flower name "vetch" comes from old French veche and even older French vece. This is derived from the Latin word vicia, which just proves that everything sounds better in Latin.

I was walking along, thinking of all the flowers I have learned about, and the one that stuck in my head was 'Vetch', or Bird Vetch. I wondered where that awful name came from so I looked it up on my cell phone. Anything to pass the miles.

During one of my crossings with Theresa she pointed out that the thunderstorm we had been worried about all day was definitely in existence and was headed our way. We kept a close eye to the sky from this point forward and kept our hops short.

Random Road Hiking Thought #8. If Society collapsed utterly and it was up to me I don't think I could reinvent the toaster let alone the smartphone.

Think about it. We are surrounded by technology. We could not live our lives without it. Smart phone? Yeah, I have no idea how all that works. Plastic and metal in a box, behind a touch-sensitive piece of glass. I sort of understand the apps, but the mechanics of the whole send-and-receive protocol that allows me to walk down the road and find out where the word 'vetch' came from is beyond me. I couldn't 'invent' the car even if I had one in front of me as a model. I don't even know what makes toasters heat up, and then suddenly stop cooking and present the finished product like a culinary jack-in-the-box.

Nope. If society collapses, expect a lot of Dutch oven cooking over a bed of coals. That, at least, I understand.

At the corner of A and 66 we passed by this little everything-store in the town of Alban. They see a lot of IAT hikers stopping in, and I'm sure they are grateful for the steady foot traffic that brings them a meager but reliable flow of business. We have done our part many times, stopping to buy stuff. Today - forget it. We could hear thunder. Our goal was a little more than a mile to the north. If we stopped in for anything it was unlikely we would make it.

Random Road Hiking Thought #9. Trying to beat lightning storms is like driving around the gates at the railroad tracks. Sooner or later you're going to get hit.

Lion's Camp that-a-way. 1.1 miles to go, and the wind was starting to pick up. The thunder was still off in the distance, but that can change very quickly. It was a race against time, and a dance with the Devil.

Random Road Hiking Thought #10. Left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right...

Moving fast now, all I could think about was getting to the end. Once we committed to this last mile, one of us had to get to the car to rescue the other if the skies opened up.

There are no more photos to drag out the drama. Beneath blackening skies we marched as fast as we could go while the wind picked up and the trees started whipping around over our heads. I crossed paths with Theresa, me headed to the car and she headed down to the store in Alban. There was refuge for each of us to run to, if it came to that. 

I was the first to reach the goal, and I jumped in and drove back down to the store, that Theresa was urgently trying to get to. The rain was now an imminent threat and the lightning too close for comfort. I stood ready to drive out and get her if needed, but she made it in time. 

Once more, we had dodged the storm. 

There was just enough time for us to drive back north and jump out of the car for a quick photo. 

As we pulled out of the lot to head home we saw a hiker about two tenths of a mile down the road. We pulled over to ask her if she needed a ride (and give her a snail patch, of course). She said that her car was just up at the Lion's Camp, so if she hurried she would be OK. We let her go and wished her luck. 

She didn't make it. Thankfully, wet was all she got. 

The skies did indeed open up on the Fourth of July, and the stupendous downpour was one I will not soon forget. Rain came down in buckets and sheets, too fast to even run off the road, which made hydroplaning a real threat. We drove slowly. 

We went home via Highway 49, and when we got to the town of Elderon we were stopped at the intersection by someone taking on official though obviously temporary traffic control duties. We had made it just in time to get a front row seat to one of the wettest parades I have ever witnessed in my life. 

I looked in my side-view mirror and couldn't believe what I saw next. I've seen kids on horses doing dumb things (been there, done that) but this seemed right up there. 

The parade continued, and to the credit of the townspeople it was meant to entertain, they were there in force on the side of the road, to the point where there were still children racing to pick up the candy that was being thrown by the sodden people standing in the open rain on the floats as they passed by. 

And near the back came the reason why those kids came scooting up the highway on their horses. They were a part of the parade. 

The photos do not do it justice. Even the video doesn't really show the amount of water that was falling from the sky. I suppose when I was 14 or 16 it would have been an adventure to go out riding my horse in the parade during a thunderstorm, if I had ever owned a horse. 

These weren't trail horses, but I'll bet they didn't hesitate any when they were pointed towards home. The horses, at least, would have known enough to get out of the rain. 

The tally:

• 5 or 6 new Snails today (we didn't get to see them all)
• Completed map 45
• Converted 5.6 miles of biking to the 'hiked' category
• 20.1 miles to go. 

Running Total: 1211.7 miles of trail covered (1116.9 hiked), 413.8 miles 'extra' hiking/biking. End of Day 207.

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