Hunt Hill Audubon Sanctuary (9)

Just a fair warning, when it is hot and humid and after 5PM, I DO NOT RECOMMEND taking children out for a relaxing hike. With that being said, we did that exact thing. Overall, I would call it a win. We saw beautiful twin bambies and their momma on the drive there, and we experienced a true Wisconsin traffic jam with cows blocking our way on our ride home (it's also possible we took a wrong turn somewhere along the way!). The only downside is that it was hot, humid, and close to supper time!!

According to their website (hunthill.org),  Hunt Hill is a nature preserve and learning center, open to all, dedicated to fostering the understanding, appreciation, and protection of the environment. Our facility boasts some of the most beautiful and unique habitats found in Wisconsin – bogs, old growth forests, meadow, and four glacial lakes.

You can also find maps for their hiking trails on their website. Just don't get me to read it, I have no idea where we were. They also have themed discovery hikes where you can find objects along one of the trails. This is the real reason we went to check it out. I guess if you pick to go on the last day of the month, you miss out on that...OOPS!

Oh well, we enjoyed exploring, nearly got trampled by deer along the trail (they weren't that close, but it was a little alarming hearing them go so fast!!) Poor Quinn probably thought I was nuts because I wanted her to give up her position at the front of the line!  So we checked out the big and the beautiful flowers and then grabbed some pizza in Spooner!

Fun was had by all (mostly...did I mention it was hot?)

By the bog

Tahlia & Quinn

We picked up an extra.

Sophie & Mylee

Lake view

Hiking along.

Leading the way!

Love.

Pretty flowers.

Field of beauty!

The Milk Pail (8)

If you are looking for everything Wisconsin, I definitely recommend visiting the Milk Pail (8) in Rice Lake. With 29 flavors of ice cream you are also sure to make everyone happy! From it's unique atmosphere to it's tasty treats, this is one of our favorite summer spots and was a must for our 50 things with-in 50 miles! Check out their website for more info: http://www.themilkpail.net/

Ice cream is especially great on a warm summer day! Lucky for these sisters to get a pool to hang out in during this unusual summer of COVID-19 and limited public access! Quinny finally realized she can actually touch the pool!

Bear Lake Sedge Meadow

Adventure number 7 was found on another geocache, so this might be cheating a little, but it is still a place within 50 miles, it's about 2 miles from our house which is even better! Welcome to the Bear Lake Sedge Meadow- a state natural area. It's not a whole lot to look at, it's full of mosquitoes too! But we did get a catch and that made stop 7 totally worth it!!

Grantsburg Drive-in (5) and Mini-golf (6)

We try to avoid public places with all the unknown of COVID-19. But you can only do so much hiking before that gets old, so we ventured out for an outdoor dining experience and a round of Mini-golf. A Sunday afternoon drive to Siren and Grantsburg sounded fun and is in our 50ish mile radius.

The Grantsburg Drive-in (5) is one of our favorite treats. According to it's website, diners can "Venture back to the 50’s You’ll find carhops in poodle skirts, homemade root beer and old fashioned, hand-packed burgers!" It might not quite feel like the 50s but the food really is delicious!

We love Mini-golf and decided to check out Moose Mulligan's Adventure Golf (6) in Siren, WI. This 18 hole course is challenging enough and exciting enough for our family of 5. The blue water was a clear favorite of Quinn's and Mylee liked to fetch our balls out of the water. After trying to teach Tahlia how to golf right handed, we decided left was a better choice!

All in all adventures 5 & 6 were worth the drive!

Geocache #4

Adventure number 4 involves our first geocache experience.  We picked the closest one (.3 miles away) because we could walk there and we wanted to introduce it to the girls.  Our GPS led us to the Haugen Dam.  We searched and searched for our cache, but never did find it.  Quinn and Tahlia and I went back the next day and still couldn't find it.  Our app tells us it's tiny.  So better luck next time, but we can't wait to do more geocaching!

These pictures are from a walk earlier in the month, but who can pass up rainbows--and I didn't take any pictures of our Geocache adventure. 

Devil's Kettle - #3

Just look at the colors!

Devil's Kettle (3) is tucked away in the Blue Hills of Northern Wisconsin, in Rusk County.  It's about a 20 minute drive from Haugen.  I've heard people talk about it before, but we had never made the trek.  So, one sunny Sunday afternoon, we decided to hit up this local treasure.  The trailhead is not marked, but lucky for us, someone else was parked there.  Although, If you google Devil's Kettle Wisconsin, it pretty much takes you right there (Devil's Kettle Trailhead, County Hwy W, Weyerhaeuser, WI 54895).  My best advice would be to follow that, if you start seeing trails that say Private Property--you went too far.

Devil's Kettle involves a pretty short hike (about 5 minutes) but has at least an hours worth of exploring.

50 things in 50 miles

Before COVID-19, we decided that we hadn't explored local enough.  It seems fitting now as we are choosing to stay pretty local.  So, this summer we will be exploring 50 things within 50 miles.  Our adventures begin with (1) Rustic Road 83 and the (2) Ice Age Trail.

Staying home is hard with 3 girls, so we often go for drives.  We like to play the left, right, left game where at every intersection a different person gets to choose which direction we go in.  This led us to  Rustic Road 83.  This road is located at 13 3/4-16 Street/Narrow Gauge Rd.  It follows the route of an old railroad line used in the logging era.  The road goes through the 4,100 acre Barron County Forest and has a great variety of trees and wildlife.  Everyone enjoyed seeing a sun-washed deer carcass, it looked pretty cool.  On our way home from one of our drives we saw 16 dear along the side of the road.  This was near Bear Lake.

Scoping out the Trail.

The Ice Age trail is a 1000 mile footpath that highlights the remnants of the glaciers from 12,000 years ago.  The trail treks throughout Wisconsin and is one of only eleven National Scenic Trails.  You can read more about it at http://iceagetrail.org.

There are a few trailheads for us to choose from within a 20 minute or less drive.  Because we enjoyed the Rustic Road, we chose the Grassy Lake Segment to explore.  Next, we decided on the Bear Lake Segment because it comes out by the Boy Scout Camp and appeared to be a pretty easy hike.  The only problem with reading a map online and seeing that the Grassy Lake Segment turns in to the Bear Lake Segment is that you don't consider that there might be separate trailheads.  So after a nice hike, a great picnic, and about 4 miles of hiking, we realized we might be on the wrong trail.  Our 4 mileish hike turned into an 8 mile hike as we had to backtrack.  It was quite the adventure as we had trekked through lots of mud and wet grass.  Mylee even fell in one of the puddles!  But what's life without a little adventure?  The girls were troopers.  I definitely recommend getting an actual map, especially if you are planning more than one adventure to the ice age trail!

Picnic Time!

Starting our Adventure!

Family Time!