Baraboo Burger Company: Well Fed and in the Red

Baraboo Burger Company is red. Their sign is red. Their awning is red. The bar is red brick with a red counter and red lighting. Even the little paper basket-liners were red. You know what else was red? The inside of my burger. That's something I don't always get - and not for lack of …

Devil’s Lake: The Devil’s in the Details

Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien. ~ Voltaire Lisa and I were both super excited about this hike and intended to do it together. That would have been perfect. Unfortunately, we couldn't seem to ever coordinate our busy lives to be in Wisconsin at the same time. After several years of failing to make it …

Mill Creek Gorge: Milling Around in Downtown Youngstown

Spring was in the air and, once again, I was headed for my regular gig in Baileys Harbor, Wisconsin. That meant yet another trip west on good-ole Interstate 80. I had a three-point hiking plan and punto uno was Mill Creek Gorge in Youngstown, OH. Downtown-inside-the-city-limits Youngstown, OH. I pulled into the lot off of …

Ramapo Lake and the Van Slyke Castle: Russet, Rocks, and Ruins

It was early March and the world was brown. At least my world was. I was in Montclair, New Jersey on business and had a free afternoon. What to do? I decided to take a brown hike. I arrived at the brown trailhead at ten of twelve in the morning and set off past a …

The Long Pond Trail: Pondering Along the Trail

There are no lakes in Rhode Island. Okay, that's not strictly true, but out of the two-hundred-thirty-seven largest bodies of water in The Ocean State, a scant eighteen use the descriptor "lake". The rest are ponds ... and the occasional reservoir. I'm sharing this tiny droplet of hydro-trivia because I myself was floundering in a …

Mummy Mountain: I Miss My Mummy

I do, and though she passed in 2010, I'm not actually talking about my mother. Neither am I referring to long-dead Egyptian Pharos. What I am referring to is a small trail sign that, missed, caused us the misfortune of climbing a delightful knoll with stellar views of the Santa Clara Valley. Not really a …

Garrapata State Park: From Redwoods to the Granite Coast

"Nestled at the base of the Santa Lucia Range, Garrapata’s 2,939 acres encompass a spectacular rocky shoreline next to a beautiful inland area of steep mountains and deep redwood canyons." That's the way the Garrapata State Park brochure describes the area. Short. Succinct. Evocative. Lisa was a little less succinct (but equally evocative) in explaining …

Nashotah Park: I Walked in Fields of Gold

"But I swear in the days still left we'll walk in fields of gold" ~ Sting I try to get a little hiking in anytime I'm traveling. When I'm traveling for work, picking a hike often translates to the equivalent of throwing a dart at a map. Just kidding - it's all very scientific. I …

The Chubby Trout: Salty About Salt

Let me take you back to the thrilling days of yesteryear. (Cue descending harp glissando) It is 2008, and my father and I are in his Jeep Grand Cherokee headed for Door County, Wisconsin. We intended to clear his piece of land for a home to be built. We stopped in Elkhart, Indiana (about two-thirds …

Pokagon State Park: Take Two

It was 2017. Lisa and I were headed east from Wisconsin when we passed one of those little brown road signs. "Pokagon State Park", she mumbled. "Pokémon State Park?!" I exclaimed. This was at the height of the Pokémon Go craze. "You don't mean to tell me ..." "No", she interjected, "Poke-a-gon", she over-enunciated. "Don't …