A quick breakfast in Milwaukee Sunday morning and then we were on our way.
The plan for this leg was to spend the day in Madison, then continue on to Green Bay for the night & do sightseeing there in the morning. The drive times were not so bad, but it still required a mildly early start.
Upon arriving in Madison, our first stop was the Olbrich Botanical Garden. Here is an extensive number of photos from it:
It was a neat place! An ideal size - not too big - and plenty to see. Clearly other people agree with me, since they seemed to be setting up for a wedding while we were there:
And then, right about the time we were crossing the rooftop terrace:
I looked down through a window and spotted Mary Beth!
Who used to work with me at the Portland Library in Louisville. I dashed down to see her, and she was just as shocked as I was to be crossing paths! She was in town with her husband, and they had decided to come up just for a random getaway for an extended weekend. Never would have expected to run into her, or indeed anyone I know, in Madison Wisconsin, although I am reminded of the time my family took a trip to the Grand Canyon in the summer of 1999, only for my sister to spot a classmate of hers in the gift shop.
Mary Beth & her husband advised us that there was a big food festival going on near the Capitol Building, which was our next stop in Madison. This made us groan, since it meant crowds and difficult parking, but we pressed on nonetheless. The festival turned out to be really great, and parking was only a handful of blocks away, so no great harm there:
We had a nutritious lunch of BBQ sliders and cheese curds:
And then it was time for the Capitol itself:
The inside was very ornate:
One of the more impressive Capitol buildings I've seen, and let's face it: at this point I've gotta be among the experts in this genre.
The tour began and we rose through the layers:
Into various rooms and chambers:
With some quality murals:
That last image is where the Wisconsin State Assembly meets, and also where the tour ended. We were still able to roam the building, though, and there were further layers up to climb:
I appreciated that we could ascend into the stratosphere. And as an added bonus, we could exit to the outside balcony and walk around!
And look upon the festival, still going on below.
That was that for Madison; dad had identified a creamery in the middle of nowhere on our way to Green Bay, so we set a course for that. I think we were picturing a large farmland, barns and silos, and a factory with extensive tours. It was not that, sadly, but it was still neat to go to some off-the-beaten-path cheese shop in rural Wisconsin:
And hey, we got some free samples out of it.
Finally, we at last arrived in Green Bay, just in time for check-in at the hotel and dinner. After dinner, we strolled along the Fox River, which dribbles out of the end of the actual Green Bay to bisect the town, and Appleton, too, further to the south, before depositing into Lake Winnebago.
The next morning, it was time at last. Time to visit the one, the only: Gumbo Field, home of the Green Bean Packers!
This was great fun. I am not terribly much of a sports guy myself (although I'm becoming more and more of one with all the tickets I get through work...but that's another story), but I still enjoyed touring this *~*iconic*~* stadium and learning a bit of the history of why this random town in random Wisconsin had one of the most legendary football teams in the country.
Plus we got to go up in one of the box seats!
Quite a view. Then, the tour took us down onto the field itself. There was this kind of amusing moment where they pipe in crowd sounds and music as you're walking out of the tunnel to simulate being a player on the team on gameday:
The tour ended back where it began, in the lobby, and then we exited through the gift shop back out front:
Before taking off, we carefully planned our exodus from Wisconsin considering lunch, drivetimes, and of course, an upcoming change in time zone, then headed out.
