Legion Lake Lunch Break

Legion Lake

Just a quick stop at Legion Lake for lunch. I’ve been driving most of the morning, time for a break. This post is mainly to put a pin in my geomap tracker thingy. Here’s a view of the lake without my truck getting in the way. Small but peaceful lake, looks like a great place … Read more

Needles Highway

Needles Highway - Scenic Overlook towards Cathedral Spires

The Needles Highway (SD-87) is a 14-mile scenic drive through some of the best scenery in the Black Hills of South Dakota. It is also part of the larger double-loop Peter Norbeck Scenic Byway. This is by no means an exhaustive guide to the road – just some photos I took during my adventure. Less … Read more

Welcome to Minnesota Sign

Welcome to Minnesota sign

One of the quirks of road-tripping is encountering all the fun little oddities along the way. State welcome signs fall into that category for me. Just north on IA-60 (which turns to MN-60) from Hawkeye Point at the intersection of 100th Street in the town of Bigelow you’ll find one of the “Minnesota Welcomes You” … Read more

Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail – Lansing to Potosi (2024)

Dugway Road Overhang - Bro Flexing for The 'Gram

Hanging out with some Toyota friends again for a weekend of camping and southwest Wisconsin (and Iowa) gravel road exploration on the Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail, or TWAT for short. Basically a repeat of some points from 2023 but this time I’m too lazy to break apart in separate posts for the locations. Shout out … Read more

Baxter’s Hollow Rapids

Baxter's Hollow Rapids

Darkness was setting in as I reached the final stop on the weekend’s adventure. I had not expected water levels on Otter Creek to be flowing quite so well at Baxter’s Hollow, but I frantically scrambled to get some photos before I was completely out of light. So after driving to the end of Stones … Read more

Wisconsin River Overland Tour

Wisconsin River Overland Tour - Tacoma glamor shots

Leaving Wyalusing and heading home, a few of us decided to take an alternate route called the Wisconsin River Overland Tour, or WROT for short. It was shared to us by a TacomaWorld forum member but was un-verified by anyone in our group, and there isn’t much info about it online. A couple of the … Read more

Potosi Point

Potosi Point - Bald eagle flying back towards shore with a fresh fish catch

The endpoint of this weekend’s group expedition was at Potosi Point, a small peninsula that sticks out into the Mississippi River and has a small boat launch at the end. Our group of Toyotas broke into two groups to start the day to keep our length on the trails manageable. Group #1 arrived first and … Read more

Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail – Lansing to Potosi

Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail - Flexing shenanigans at graffiti rock on Dugway Road

Starting off from Mount Hosmer Park in Lansing, Iowa, our goal today was to explore the southern section of the Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail. This is a popular route leading over gravel roads and through scenic areas of the “driftless region”. This is definitley not a comprehensive photo journal of the trip, just some shots … Read more

Mount Hosmer Park

Mount Hosmer Park - Views across the Mississippi River valley

Heading out from camp at Wyalusing State Park we quickly encountered some ominus rain clouds. We often joke that it wouldn’t be one of our normal outings if rain wasn’t involved (oh, if you only knew how true this is). Today we were actually welcoming precipitation to keep down the dust on gravel roads. Crossing … Read more

Canoecopia 2023

Canoecopia 2023 - Wide view of main exhibit floor

Ever since I started paddling a couple years back I’ve wanted to attend Canoecopia in Madison, Wisconsin. The pandemic had other plans, but thankfully in 2023 it’s back on track. Originally I planned to attend both weekend days but ended up only going Sunday due to unforseen delays. I didn’t get to see as many … Read more