Seg #20 Great River State Trail

Seg #20 Great River State Trail (Midway, WI out and back) 6-21-13

Start	Midway, WI	N 43.92757W-91.25027	NS Miles 6.3
End	Black River	N 43.95985,W-91.33813	Trl lgth 24mi/Ride 19.5mi

Ride hrs 2:02

AVS 9.5

MXS 13.9

KCAL 1641

Temp 84

Elev 662

Because of the missing purse fiasco the previous day, my chauffeur was not in the frame of mind try to find me up or down any trail. So, the ride plan was changed from riding to Tempealeau from LaCrosse to driving to unincorporated Midway, Wisconsin and riding out five miles and then back to the car. The Great River is a 24-mile trail that travels along America’s biggest river, through prairies and backwaters of the upper Mississippi River valley. Built on an abandoned Chicago-Northwestern railroad line, the trail is in Wisconsin's scenic Coulee Region, part of the Driftless Area that was untouched by glaciers during the last Ice Age. We took our time getting to the trail since a severe thunderstorm struck early in morning. A large group of golfers were hanging out at the motel ranting about the weather and vehemently exaggerating hole-in-one stories. Eventually we drove out of the rain and ended up in Midway. The miles north of Midway were what I needed for my venture, but somehow I trusted the bartender at the local pub to give me the correct directions as to whether I should go right or left for a northerly heading. “Just go up the trail”, the swashbuckler spit out and pointed to the front door. So that is the way I rode. It took but a few miles to make me wonder if the way I was going was correct. I wish I had used the compass the Perio Department at Georgia gave me on my last day. A compass would have helped more than my GPS, especially since the GPS latitude appeared to be increasing. That would mean I was going north. Because I didn’t remember the Midway start coordinates correctly, I was convinced I was indeed going north. But after another three miles, it was clear I was in the north part of Lacrosse---Damn!  I went south rather than north! Around I turned and headed back to Midway. When Connie saw me riding by, she thought, “What the Heck, he must have gone the wrong way". Yes I did! Since I needed to get some positive latitude so I headed north. No sooner than a mile up the trail, a large ash tree had blown down on the trail. The storm that passed through early that morning was a toughie. After carrying the bike over the branches I was back to riding again only

The Great River State Trail is a crushed limestone

surface a majority of the way. I took this photo

looking back where I crawled through the

first fallen tree; there is only a small hole

of light in this picture. Normally the opening

would be five to six times larger. There were

many limbs on the trail to dodge. I have seen worse.

to have a  another  tree divert me. In the scope of a few miles, I had to negotiate five downed  trees. The storm that hit us up the road had torn through the trail with authority. It was interesting that every fallen tree was an Ash. Probably the heavy volume of seeds limited air flow and created a resistant surface, much like a solid back yard fence. With all the obstacles on the trail, I decided to turn around and go back to Midway. Since was unable to get all my needed degrees of latitude, I will need to find another trail to make up the lost miles due to not making it to Tempealeau (pronounced “temp low”). So after five to tens miles of north-south credit, we headed for home. We got back to Coralville before dark---I don't like driving in the dark. The cats were happy to see us and chipmunks probably groaned sensing the hiatus from my trapping was over.