Day by Day breakdown - Day Two

Day Two is the route from Mauston, WI to Grand Forks, ND. About 500 miles, with the only super major obstacle being Minneapolis, Minnesota traffic.

I've been to Minneapolis a couple of times, but never for very long. Mostly stopovers at the airport, which hardly count for 'being there'. I've driven through it in a driving rain, staying on I-94, but that can't really count for visiting either. To be honest, I think I'd rather visit some other areas in Minnesota that I've heard about: Ely, Duluth, Hibbing, Rochester, Winona, Mankato, etc. Knowing there's a ton of family researching I'd like to do in Minnesota, I think we'll be content to -once again- blow by most of this on our way to the greater expanses of the West. I promist that these day-by-day prognostications will get more interesting as we start to hit areas that hold great promise (and that are too far away for a long weekend to explore).

I can tell you this: I'll be on the lookout for fun and interesting stuff for later on!

Day by Day breakdown - the planned stops

(I'm hoping to share what I *think* each day will encompass, in terms of sights to see, Kodak moments, and where we'll stop for the night. We'll see how close I get once the trip is underway. In any case, I'm showing my hand a bit on what I *think* we'll do and we can see how that varies once we are underway. So many little things can alter plans significantly...)



Major Stopping Points - Day One



Fort Wayne, IN to Mauston, WI - about 386 miles.

Day one begins with our departure, planned tentatively for about 7 am from my driveway. The hope is to clear what little Saturday morning traffic there is in Fort Wayne by departing before it gets the slightest bit heavy. We're heading west on US 30 to start the route and since that's primarily country areas and farms (yes, I know that MOST of Indiana is farms!) we should be able to make good time in getting to Valpo.



The hope is to bed down for the night in Mauston, WI, about 20 miles from the Wisconsin Dells, which ought to be good and hectic considering this will be a holiday weekend in an enhanced, high traffic summer time weekend. Depending on what kind of arrangement, if any, I can get done with a major hotel chain or group of hotels, we'll likely end day one at a recognizable brand name hotel. In my mind's eye, I picture great weather, light traffic and the ability to 'swiftly' get through Chicago's wonderful pothole-infested highway snarl without being swallowed up into a toll-road gorge. The official website for Mauston is http://www.mauston.com/ is light on detail, sparse on excitement, but at least it's there. That gives us a good starting point. Another may be the local newspaper, http://www.wiscnews.com/jcst/, but I haven't really looked that site over yet. Doing so at the moment just seems like work and since it's a Saturday night as I type this, I'm not in 'work' mode. Since I'm really raring to get a lot of miles under our belts as early as possible, we may simply wave at Mauston and keep on trucking, depending on our fatigue, weather, traffic and the time of day. If that happens, it's likely that Eau Claire, WI will be our next stopping point for the evening.



BUT considering that Mauston is still planned for the first night's rest, I did find a couple rave reviews online for the Roman Castle Restaurant, which may be our stop for dinner. It looks to be less than a mile form the interstate, and depending on where our hotel is, it could be it. It doesn't sound bad for an Italian eatery, and what I can tell, they don't serve your meal in a wrapper, so that's already a bonus! As usual, I'll try talking to someone 'official' before the date comes and see if they can recommend something more 'reflective' of their community's belief that this is the 'best place to eat and mingle with Mautsonites, or Maustonians (and I'll clear that up as well!).



Other than just getting day one under our belts, I don't really plan on stopping anywhere else along the way. Sorry about that Illinois and Wisconsin, but you are a day trip away, so we'll save the sightseeing for another time when we don't have the "4,800 miles to go" sign staring us in the face as we unload for the night.



If you know this area, or have some great suggestions for things we should see, (or you'd like us to see and report back on) lemme know by commenting below. But keep in mind, Cubs fans, that we aren't stopping in Chicago for the most obvious reasons...(we can come here anytime. This time we just wanna blow by this windy city and get some miles in.)



And that's just Day One.

The beginning approacheth! Counting down from 365!

Finally I'm getting to the point where I feel that my excitement is justified (or at least can be justified by those who are pained by my constant yammering about this trip). Time is flying by right now, and on July 3 of this year, I'll be able to start counting down from 365 days. As it stands now, I'm counting down from 430 days til 'launch' date.

Couple of feel good moments lately, and signs of life for this trip: Responses from Vancouver, BC tourism folks (although it felt an awful lot like an electronic form letter) and a great response from the Travel Salem (Oregon) folks. Anthony Tham from that office wrote back personally to ask a few more details and make some suggestions of places to visit during our time in Oregon. That was just what I needed when I was beginning to think that this was FAR more exciting in my head than it was in anyone else's.


Let me be the first to admit that I've never given Oregon much thought until now. I always kind of assumed that Oregonnites, Oregonions (Oreganos?) or whatever you call them were just kind of 'stuck' between Washington and California. Kind of a no-man's land between complete wacko's (California) and caffeine-hyped, rain-soaked, great-northwest wackos (Washington). But, as I'm hoping to really discover on this trip, my stereotyping doesn't hold up under the real scrutiny of daily life. Oh, sure, I'm positive I could find lots of examples of West Coast Wacko out there, but I'm finding that the more I connect, the more likeable, down-to-Earth, and similar people I find.


Back to Oregon. I really have known only a few people actually from there, or who lived there for any respectable amount of time. One of them is Chris Norman, a colleague from my Knight Ridder days who still travels frequently back to the Beaver State. I very much respect Chris, so I already had some predisposition to say that not ALL Oreganos (I like that name the best) were tree-hugging crazies. In fact, I just get that false generalization from the entertainment media (most of your 'chain-me-to-the-big-tree-before-dozers-come' characters seem to be from Portland. How many made for TV movies seem to follow that trend?). So anyway, Anthony Tham was quick to respond and let me know that he'd be happy to help me organize our visit to his area, on behalf of Travel Salem. He even suggested our visiting Silverton, Oregon, because it was named one of the Top 10 Coolest Small Towns in America by Budget Travel magazine, and I had suggested to him that we were interested in seeing smaller towns. Salem is the state capital and with a population of close to 400,000 in the two counties that surround it, it ain't exactly a 'small, quaint village'. I haven't committed to visiting Silverton just yet, but I will definately look into it. When it's somebody's job to point out places, features, highlights and must-see's, and they recommend something, it's just good sense (and polite) to listen and take heed!

I think Anthony is probably still scratching his head over exactly what this trip is all about. I'm still doing a bit of that myself. However, things are just showing hints of starting to gel in earnest now, and it just means that this place will soon be hopping with updates.

Next steps will be in securing some sponsors to help defray some of the costs. Since I know how tight corporations are, I'd better start now! Anybody got an inside with hoteliers? I'm not brand loyal at this point, but I'm willing to be!