Entry for August 10, 2008 - Avoca, WI

Some days are good for taking photos, others not so good. Today was a great day!

August should be the dog days of summer, but today was refreshingly cool and sunny thanks to a cold front passing by yesterday afternoon. The high topped off in the mid-70F's. There were no clouds and only a slight haze evident. I was on my own today, my sister was up to other things. I chose to explore an area near the lower Wisconsin River with a "lonely geocache" that has been hidden for years, but not visited much according to the logs. Just outside the town of Avoca, Wisconsin.

The way to enter was not evident as I approached, but that is the bluff I'm climbing right away.

The parking was 1/3 mile down a gravel road, and across these railroad tracks.

A State Wildlife Area. Heavy on the "wild".

Yes, this was actually the way up the hill. No maintained trail, but a "ridge road" that DNR wardens drive up with ATV's apparently. A little narrow for a truck.

I can't tell you how many of these spider webs I wiped off of my face.

I walked no closer than 250 feet or so away from the geocache following the "ridge road" and kept going on thinking I would see a cross-trail. It pretty much just continued through this alpine prairie at the top of the bluff. I'm around 300 feet above where I parked now.

One of the 16,000 trees mentioned in this sign is growing 12 inches in front of it.

On the way up in wooded area I scared-up an entire roost of wild turkeys. I was kind of slow with the camera, and I had decided to use my 24mm prime lens on this "outward leg" of the journey to capture scenery. I would have only recorded dark blobs. However, this butterfly just kept flying right to me and I had a photo op with this prime lens.

The grass is getting thicker here, and I'm still walking farther away from the geocache. I spotted a turkey buzzard flying overhead, and decided it was time to bring out the 70-300mm zoom lens I bought last weekend. The bird flew away before I got it switched.

Then another butterfly happened by.

Well, I'm not finding an obvious route to the cache still. I turned around and worked my way back to just inside the woods, and then saw a game trail, going the right way. More spider webs too.

The game trail led right to the geocache location. Hooray!

Still working with the 300mm zoom, really had to back off to take these photos.

Geocache duly logged, and time to decend. Well, I'm 600 feet off the regular route, better find the way out of that first. I did a little bushwacking off the game trail to decrease the back-tracking.

An open view of the road below. Still pretty high-up here.

I only had about 3 miles or so recorded at the end. I had another geocache targeted about 4 miles down the highway, but that was in a wetland. I was looking right at an entrance to another access road into a wildlife area by the Wisconsin River, so I decided instead to walk that way and see if I can capture some more wildlife (other than butterflies and spiders) with the new zoom lens.

First a blackbird

Now a crane

A different type of butterfly

Avoca Lake. Made by a dam I was standing on here.

A monarch

The butterflies were just too easy.

A view of the prairie. The entire area had bluffs around it.

Either the same or a different crane here. I didn't get to check his ID.

The access road I'm walking on is getting less distinct.

Haven't seen wildlife for a while now. Time for a flower.

A bird

A sign

Another flower

Way off there where you see the ridge come to an end is where that geocache was located at.

Hey, a Leopard Frog.

Also seen but not photographed was a roadkill turtle, very fresh roadkill snake, and a live turtle that dove into water faster than I could move.

I knew I was getting close to the Wisconsin River. Here it is.

Walking back, a live snake this time.

A very cool-looking butterfly on the dam

The gate for this access road was open, and there was at least 2 Subarus that I came across parked by the river. So when I got back to my Jeep, I put the top down, and decided to do some 4-wheelin' Yee-haw!

Drove back to the river bank and switched to the 24mm lens once again for more photos.

By foot, I covered 5 miles.

The route on a topo map

Now on a USGS aerial photo

And the elevation profile of the hike. This one came out reasonably accurate this time.

I took the scenic route home, driving towards Spring Green, Wisconsin past Taliesin (Frank Lloyd Wright's home), The House on the Rock Resort (formerly The Springs), and American Players Theater. Had the top down the whole way, just enjoying the drive home. I'm pretty satisfied with the $75 70-300mm lens as of now.