The ride started on fast four lane highways but developed into a nice trip after turning off of 12 onto 33. It was especially fun through Wildcat Mountain Park.
Sam and the Sullivans at Wildcat Mountain
We met up with the others at the Best Western outside of Sparta for a meet and greet. Then headed to a restaurant downtown to get to know each other better.
The Sullivans, who were so nice to let me borrow the Vespa GTS.
It had 4734 miles on it when I started, 5442 at the end of my rides.
From there we had a ride, the Mendoro Cut loop that started awkwardly as a vital bridge was closed. So we headed further out on the highway to pick up the good roads. The roads up to the cut were good and the cut interesting. It used to be a tunnel until that was changed many years ago.
Farmland
Barns everywhere.
Hay bales.
Mindoro Cut
Ssme of the guys.
From there we had a great stop at the Top Dawgs Pub in the tiny town of Mindoro.
Mendoro town center. The bar is in the middle.
Very inexpensive place to get a drink.
Then we covered some more good roads, visiting a park filled with primative glass art work.
Beautiful scenery, as long as you like hills, meadows and farms.
I found it to be terrific
Green farms on the flats, beautiful hills beyond.
Dave is quite tall
Landlocked boat
Looks just like my wedding cake from 30 years ago.
The glass flag
The artist's wife. The graves were from the 1930's.
Then we found ourselves on a washed out gravel road that had one scooter go down. Sam enjoyed the dirt and I was fine with it, even coasting down the steep downgrades with the engine off as it got quite hot heading up.
We knew we were in for a treat when the surface changed.
Didn't quite expect this though.
My favorite sign
But we all made it back to the hotel and headed to dinner in town.
Sparta is the bicycle capitol of Wisconsin.
Nice photos, Bill. Repeating myself, but lovely meeting you and Sam. So glad it all worked out well to get up here and ride with us. Just realized you rode past Wildcat mountain on the way up, so you got there twice anyway.
ReplyDeleteJust missed the Amish Wal-Mart though.
Have a bit of a love-hate relationship with that gravel road...wasn't too kind to the family as you know. But it was fun to ride. Just glad it wasn't any longer than it was.
Someone mentioned Wildcat Mountain while there and I didn't realize that we rode through ti with the Sullivan's. It is a nice road, as were most. I hope that Gabriella is healing well.
DeleteWith Sam in Chicago and these the best roads in the Midwest, I will be coming more. I enjoyed every minute.
BTW, I think that I was never going to get the group out of that bar. If I would have known it was going to be so popular, I would have added it to the list of attractions ;) A great break from the heat, and they didn't do any gouging of the tourists either....
ReplyDeleteThat pub was perfect for me. Cool with a shandy to drink, it was just what we needed.
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