September 5, 2004

September 5, 2004

Day 80

 

 

Tonight we are in South Beloit, Illinois, 73 miles southwest of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and 97 miles northwest of Chicago, Illinois. We are right on the border between Wisconsin and Illinois. Beloit is in Wisconsin and South Beloit is in Illinois.

We are parked in the back lot of a GMC truck dealership awaiting service Tuesday morning. Yesterday and today the truck's starter was intermittently failing to engage. It happened a couple of times yesterday, and a few more times today. The last time it happened, it took me about 45 minutes of trial and error problem solving and some luck to get it started. When we pulled off Interstate 90 / 39 tonight to buy diesel at a Flying J, this GMC truck dealer was across the street. So here we are ... until the truck is repaired early Tuesday, hopefully.

We left Black River Falls this morning heading southwest on I-94. After awhile, I-94 merged with I-90. We wanted to find out more about the Wisconsin Dells, which is both an area and a city. The Dells are sandstone rock formations / cliffs, somewhat like the hoodoos / badlands of Alberta. We left the Interstate about an hour before reaching the city of Wisconsin Dells and travelled the back roads there, hoping to catch a glimpse of "The Dells". We had already seen 2 of these tall sandstone tower like formations from the Interstate. The back roads to Wisconsin Dells were scenic, but no "dells" visible. We finally arrived in the city of Wisconsin Dells and encountered a horrific traffic jam in this little tourist town. It took us about an hour to travel about 6 blocks down the main street, which was packed with tourists, and somewhat resembled the main street of Niagara On The Lake, albeit much more "Americanized". We realized a little too late that driving into a tourist area / town on a long weekend, with the trailer attached, was a very big mistake. We won’t be repeating this mistake any time soon ! By the end of this ordeal, I was in no mood to go on a boat trip down the Wisconsin River to see the "dells". Boat tours down the river seem to be the "raison d'etre" of this town.

By this time, we were both in bad moods, and couldn't agree on what to do / what not to do. We pulled into a Wal-Mart parking lot and squabbled on and off all afternoon, interspersed with shopping, having lunch, and fiddling with the truck which wouldn't start. Finally the truck started and we set off, debating what was the best course of action to take over the next 2 days regarding where to stay for the night, where to get the truck fixed, etc..

Shortly before Madison, Interstate 39 merged with Interstate 90 / 94. Now we were on Interstate 90 / 94 / 39. We stopped at a cheese factory in De Forest, Wisconsin. We bought white cheddar curds, to compare them to the squeeky curds we used to buy in Eastern Ontario / Western Quebec. Wisconsin's curds are slightly drier in texture, and less salty. Joanne prefers these. I prefer the ones back around Ottawa. At the cheese factory, we also bought a bottle of cranberry and rhubarb wine, made by a winery in Wisconsin. We drank it tonight with supper. It was very good.

Tomorrow we're going to stay here in the dealer's parking lot, de-stress, and get caught up on minor maintenance chores, accounting, maybe buy and read a newspaper. Maybe we can both succeed in shaking off today's bad moods.

DSK