Saturday, July 8th we set off for Wisconsin with our Imagine travel trailer. While most of this trip was focused on activities in Wisconsin, we made time to check out a few places in other states on our way back. The overall trip was almost 5400 miles and 3½ weeks. This was our first full vacation in the trailer, since when we bought the trailer it was to live in it full time. Richard joined us in the middle of the trip for 10 days.
There are photos below this text that summarize the whole trip, but for some activities we have a large number of photos, so those activities have blue links in the text below to a larger collection of photos. If you want more details on on one of these activities you can follow those links.
Loading the generator on the trailer, Cliff made a boom to lift it. Generator Video Link
On the way to Wisconsin we spent a night in each of these RV Parks: Bozeman Trail Campground & RV Park, MT; The Ridge RV Park, Bowman, ND; County Line Campground, Summit, SD; and Eagle Ridge Campground, Chippewa Falls, WI.
We drove to the home and several places in Neenah, WI where Susan spent her grade school years. After spending a very rainy evening at the Milton KOA Holiday rv campground, we visited Susan’s aunt in Whitewater and drove by where both her sets of grandparents had lived. In the Milwaukee area we visited the Pabst Mansion and bought WI cheese. After we picked up Cliff’s brother at the airport, we saw the Tripoli Shrine Center and a church designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
Next was the Seidemann Family Reunion near West Bend, WI – Cliff’s and Richard’s maternal grandmother was a Seidemann. We were graciously allowed to set up our trailer on the family’s property while there. The 2 of us had arrived a few days before to help get ready for the 90th reunion. 400 of the family attended this year. Richard came in for the reunion and rode with us for the next 10 days, setting up a tent next to our trailer.
After the reunion we three took a scenic drive through a portion of the Kettle Moraine area (where a retreating glacier left behind geological accumulations), before visiting the Mitchell Park Domes (Horticultural Conservatory) in Milwaukee. We had visited the Domes years ago and had been impressed with the collection of plants, so it was disappointing to see that it is no longer as well maintained.
From there we drove to Madison and set up the trailer at William G Lunney Lake Farm County Park, Madison, WI for two days. While in the area, we took a boat tour of Lake Geneva, viewed the Olbrich Botanical Gardens grounds and toured the Wisconsin State Capitol.
We moved our trailer to the Wisconsin Riverside Resort in Spring Green, WI, and toured Taliesin, Frank Lloyd Wright’s home. The following day we went to nearby The House on the Rock Photos & Video link, which is a bizarre house filled with with a huge collection of the “unusual” in several buildings, most notably musical animations.
Then we headed to Wisconsin Dells, but on the way we saw signs for the International Crane Foundation International Crane Foundation Photos & Video link in Baraboo, WI and decided to swing by. Very glad we did as it is home to a captive population of 15 species of cranes from all over the world. We set up our trailer at Wisconsin Dells KOA Holiday for the night. Before dinner Susan and Richard took a speedboat tour of the Upper Dells waterway.
From the Dells we headed back through Neenah, stopping first to tour the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass then heading to a cheese shop in De Pere before setting up the trailer nearby in the Apple Creek Campground. We took off to spend the rest of that day and the next exploring the Door County peninsula of Wisconsin with its lighthouses, scenic coastline, and a maritime museum in Sturgeon Bay.
The next morning we made an excursion to High Cliff State Park, in Sherwood, WI, where Susan had hiked with her family as a girl. Saw the still-standing old lime kiln and sought out the Indian Mounds near the bluffs overlooking Lake Winnebago. That same day before leaving the De Pere/Green Bay area, Susan made her dream come true of touring the Packers’ Lambeau Stadium & Field Photos link – home of the Green Bay Packers football team. While Susan was there, Richard and Cliff visited the railroad museum in Green Bay National Railroad Museum Photos link.
Then we set off for the 70th annual Experimental Aircraft Association AirVenture “Fly-in”, in Oshkosh, WI. Oshkosh AirVenture Photos & Videos link: full set of our photos and links to some videos by others. Oshkosh is the world’s largest airshow with 677,000 people attending this year and over 10,000 planes flew in for the event. Available to see were homebuilts, vintage, aerobatic, warbirds, ultralights, lightplanes, rotorcraft, seaplanes, also available to attend were daily air shows, aviation museum, forums and workshops. We set up our trailer in the event’s massive RV parking lot, arriving Sunday afternoon and leaving Thursday morning.
Wisconsin Automotive Museum Photos link, in Hartford, WI has an interesting car collection, including a number of cars built in Wisconsin from the early days of the automotive industry when there were many small companies. After the museum we dropped Richard off at the Milwaukee Airport to fly back to Austin, TX. We drove to the Oakdale, WI KOA Journey rv campground for the night.
The next day we were given a tour (by a former Cray mechanical engineer) at the Chippewa Falls museum of Industry and Technology, which has an amazing display of Cray supercomputers. Cray has been known for many years for building the world’s most powerful computers. Then we started our drive homeward, spending the night in the Oakwood RV Park, just outside Mason City, IA.
The next morning and early afternoon we spent in Mason City touring the Stockman House and the Park Inn Hotel, both Frank Lloyd Wright designs. The Hotel is the last remaining hotel designed by Wright. The city is also Meredith Willson’s birthplace, so there were some “Music Man” exhibits we looked at. That night we set up camp at Adventureland Campground, Altoona, IA, and drove the next day to Pioneer Village RV Park & Campground, Minden, NE.
The next half-day we visited the adjacent Harold Warp Pioneer Village Pioneer Village Photos link: the complex comprises 28 buildings on 20 acres housing over 50,000 items of historical value, restored to operating order and housed by category. Then it was on to the Ogallala / I-80 KOA Journey campground, Ogallala, NE. Next night was our last night of sleeping in our trailer, when we stopped at Western Hills Campground & RV Park, Rawlins, WY, before arriving home in Jerome, ID on Wednesday, August 2nd.
Below are Cliff, Susan and some of Richard’s photos that provide a summery of the overall trip. For more photos on a particular activity see the blue links above.