Stoneage Ramblings

By John R. Stone

Our annual trip to spend a couple of days with our Wisconsin daughter and family was a little different this year, with the bulk of the changes varying from normal with the unseasonable weather.

The other changes, like the three granddaughters getting older, taller and wiser, were expected, the changes due to the unseasonable weather were not.

We usually take what we call the scenic route. We head down through the Twin Cities, head south on US 52 to Hampton and cut over to Red Wing and take the Great River Road to La Crescent where we head into Wisconsin to Onalaska, the suburb just north of La Crosse.

In a normal year, and we have been doing this for 14 years now so we have some perception of normal to us at least, most parts of the Mississippi River are frozen by now. Lake Pepin has always been frozen or mostly frozen over as are most of the Mississippi backwaters. And all are normally dotted with ice fishermen.

From Lake City to Wabasha, Highway 61 hugs the river so one can get a lot of nice river views. In a normal year that would be mostly ice except at the end of Lake Pepin where the lock and dam there is open water just above the dam.

This is a prime spot for eagles that like to nab a fish every now and then. Some sit on the edge of the ice and wait for fish to come near the surface, others circle above the open water and do the same thing. Not so this year.

For eagle watchers normally the birds are less spread out and it is easy to see lots of birds. Not this year.

In a normal year some places along Highway 61 there are a lot of cars parked on the edge of the highway where ice fishermen have found a hot spot on the ice to fish. Not this year.

Along the bluffs along the highway where there is rock near the bottom there is usually ice from rain and melted snow. Sometimes this ice is multi colored apparently from minerals in the rocks so one sees hues of red, blue and yellow. Not this year.

Also along the bluffs people can see some of the magnificent homes people have built well above the river which must have spectacular views. These are easier to spot in the winter because there are no leaves on the trees.

During the summer one can see barge tows, boats, collections of boats on islands in the river where people are camping or partying.

It is supposedly faster to take Highway 52 to I90 to get to the La Crosse area from south of the Twin Cities but we prefer the Red Wing route because there is so much more to see. The highway is four lanes from Wabasha to La Crescent and there is not much traffic except on weekends so it is an easy drive.

I figure that our route is about seven miles shorter than the fastest route on my iPhone and only 10-15 minutes longer time wise. And the lower speeds on Highway 61 (65 vs 70) and the fact the highway is sheltered by the bluffs are nice too. So there are a lot of good reasons for that route!

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We took the three girls out to lunch at Perkins Monday and it was extremely busy. We did get a table and the waitress warned us things would be very slow because they were so busy.

On a normal day at Perkins you can order breakfast at any time. My favorite Perkins meal is blueberry pancakes so Mary and I ordered blueberry pancakes although they were not on that day’s menu. Our waitress managed get to them for us…at the full meal price, $12.59, the lowest price of anything on the menu.

As it turned out the delay worked out well. We had over an hour as we waited just to talk with the girls, all together, without interruption or other distractions. It was great!       Sometimes things that start out looking to be bad are not. This turned out to be one of the best parts of the weekend!.