Day 17 - Ending at Wausau, WI - Wisconsin on the Kick-back

August 21, 2018

Day 17 - Ending at Wausau, WI

Up and packing at 5:23am. It was overcast with a cool breeze from the north, but it felt like a drying breeze. With no report to finish, I was loaded and on my way at 7:52am, looking for breakfast. Passed back through downtown, then on to Cenex. I ate two breakfast sandwiches this time.

Marathon Park in Wausau is where I want to be this evening (this afternoon, hopefully) - 37 miles according to my at-home figuring. It took me a moment after breakfast to figure out which road I should be on (east on CR-A), and I was finally making progress at 8:45am. Easy riding on a nice, flat road. At 9:22am, I crossed CR-F, and at 10:23am, I was south of Athens, crossing WI-97. I waved at the occupants in a few Amish buggies before getting to WI-97.

I was now on CR-M, still going east, and getting into a few hills. After a curve south, I turned left onto CR-U to keep going east.

At 11:00am I came to Meridian Road and a sign that caught my interest. I like to find NGS benchmarks, and here was a biggie - the 45 degrees north, 90 degrees west point. I didn't know this was here! I scrolled my GPS receivers to their "degrees.minutes" pages. So close - just fractions of a minute off! I decided it was worth a detour, and turned left. It was exciting to see the displays getting closer to ".000". I didn't have to detour very far before I was at a parking lot with a trail heading east.

I rode my bike along the trail, which was in good shape - everything looked new. A turn south brought me a large circle with the marker in the center. It's not an official NGS marker, but it certainly is at the correct spot, according to my GPS receivers. There are only four "45/90" points on the globe. This is so cool (to me).

Some girls showed up, having walked the trail, so I moved on so they could get pictures without me in the background. I was back where I left CR-U at 11:31am.

At noon I'd just made it to the intersection with CR-H, but there was road work activity ahead. I received approval from the sign girl to proceed. When I was out of the way enough, I wrote down the noon mileage: 21.7 miles.

I got out of the way of road work equipment several times as I made my way. At one stop, I was told to ride fast under an electrical wire that was being rehung.

I came to an "End Of Construction" sign at 1:08pm, when I met up with Stettin Drive, which I took to keep going east. Still in hills, but they were moderating.

At 2:21pm, I was on Stewart Avenue in Wausau. Fortunately, this road has a bike lane, and led me almost directly to Marathon Park. The park is fenced, so I went south some to get inside at a gate. I was at the registration station at 2:43pm, and at my chosen site (#24) at 3:08pm. Still have that cool north wind, which seems even stronger now. It made quick work on drying the wet ground cloth for the tent.

At 4:30pm, I rode my bike to the closest place to eat: La Taqueria. I had a Steak Big Burrito and root beer. That filled me up. Back at my campsite at 5:40pm.

Just one more thing to do today (write the report), and I have that just about wrapped up (at 9:55pm).

Jeff

Spent: $7.37 (breakfast) + $23 (campsite) + $11.86 plus $1 (supper) = $43.23.

Day 17 - Dorchester, WI to Wausau, WI

Heart

Comment

Link

+ plus signs indicate pictures added after returning home from the trip +