Rustic Roads

Each of Wisconsin's Rustic Roads have a maximum speed limit of 45 mph, and most connect with main roads at both ends.

 
 

4 Technicolor Road Trips

Fall color is the reason—but there’s so much more for leaf peepers to discover on these drives.

Southwestern Wisconsin: Spring Green to Muscoda

By Laura Beausire

It’s a cold, gold autumn day and you feel like exploring the remote valleys, ridges, and meandering rivers of the Driftless Area. A series of narrow bridges cross the Wisconsin River at Lone Rock. Follow Highway 133 west for a beautiful roller coaster-with-a-view ride overlooking the river in Grant County. Steal a glance at the hillsides—they’re a tapestry of glowing color.

Just before you arrive in Avoca, turn onto Hay Lane Road, which leads to the 1,885-acre Avoca Prairie and Savanna State Natural Area, the largest remnant prairie this side of the Mississippi River; its sandy ridges and wetlands look much the same today as they did before human settlement. Take your time and soak up the sea of tawny russet and misty green grasses and wildflowers; more than 200 species flourish here. If you’re lucky, you might spot one of Avoca’s rare animal species, like the red-shouldered hawk or the northern harrier. This step out of time might cost you your dry shoes, but your soul will be richer.

Continue west into Muscoda, the self-styled Morel Mushroom Capital of Wisconsin. Turn right at the Industrial Park and stop at Meister Cheese Company, which produces a galaxy of cheeses, including Wild Morel & Leek Jack and Horseradish Cheddar.

Don’t miss Ellis Nelson’s fabulously helter-skelter art studio located at the corner of Highway 133 and Second Street, just as you enter town. The yard overflows with what appears to be junk; on closer inspection, you’ll notice dozens of Nelson’s remarkably fluid and graceful metal sculptures of long-legged water birds and woodland creatures rising from tree stump perches.

Cross the river on Highway 80 and turn east onto Highway 60 for a glorious return trip, as the road hugs a lazy stretch of the Wisconsin and gilded branches provide a heavenly canopy.

Northeastern Wisconsin: Embarrass to Caroline

By Tom Davis

Near the intersection of Highway 22 and River Bank Road in southern Shawano County, a flock of sandhill cranes stalked around a picked cornfield. Already wearing their gray winter uniforms, they looked like Confederate recruits awaiting orders.

I can’t promise you’ll see cranes in this lovely swatch of the Embarrass River country, just as I can’t promise you’ll see deer, turkeys, or even a solitary bald eagle, the way I did. But I can promise handsome red barns, wooded ridges and valleys smoldering with fall color, and riverside parks that you’ll likely have all to yourself. That’s another thing I can promise: The sense, a few miles into the drive, that this is a place that hasn’t been discovered, that hasn’t “gone tourist,” even a little.

Start north of Embarrass at River Bank Road, which soon merges with Highway D. Here you’ll find tidy farmsteads, cornfields crowding the road, and the first of those barns scattered iconically across the landscape. In the distance, the variegated hues of oaks, maples, and other hardwoods ripple beneath the green crowns of pines.

Coming into Pella, be sure to visit Adams Meats (you’ll see it on the left) for a stick of wonderfully garlicky summer sausage and a chunk of locally made Belle Plaine cheese. Adams will process your bear for you, if you’ve thought to bring it along, but you’ll search the shelves in vain for a cracker to serve your cheese and sausage on. So bring your own, along with a knife to cut the stuff when you stop just down the road at Old Mill Park on the Embarrass River. It’s a pretty spot (albeit a bit unkempt), the river gurgling merrily as it braids through its bed of jumbled boulders.

Still feeling peckish? Pull up a chair at Hurricane Dawn’s, a friendly watering hole-cum-restaurant in “downtown” Pella (across the street from a very cool low-slung stone barn), where the house specialty is the mountainous Hurricane Burger.

Continuing on D out of Pella, head northwest toward Leopolis—an incongruously imposing name for such a tiny hamlet—and take a left onto South Town Line Road. Heading west now, the road dips as it passes through a tamarack swamp, the trees’ feathery needles gone a smoky gold. Rising again into farm country, watch for fences made of fieldstones, stones of a size that leave you wondering what manner of man and beast cleared them.

At the intersection of South Town Line Road and Highway G, take a left and head south on the latter to Caroline. “The Peaceful Valley,” proclaims the sign at the village limits. What might have struck you as corny sentiment a couple hours ago now seems perfectly descriptive. The historic Theodore Buettner flour mill still stands alongside its dam on the Middle Branch; upstream, at American Legion Park, signs warn, without apparent irony: “Horses are not to be tied to the trees. Use hitching posts up by bar.”

The Hidden Valley Supper Club, also in Caroline, serves up more anachronism—not so much the food, which is your basic sturdy supper club fare, but the fact that they don’t take credit cards. They will, however, trust you to drive “over the hill” to Marion, the site of the nearest ATM machine, and return to pay your bill.

In this day and age, you have to like that.

Southeastern Wisconsin: Delafield to Holy Hill

By Shannon Jackson Arnold

My dream was always to live in New England. When I landed in Waukesha County’s “Lake Country” with my husband, I realized that everything I loved about New England was right in my own backyard: the rolling hills, the fall foliage, the red barns and farm stands, the lakes dotted with boats, the charming small towns.

One of my favorite ways to savor autumn—and feed my Yankee nostalgia—is to travel north on Highway 83 from Interstate 94 in Delafield. About two miles along 83, on your left, is the 1928 renovated barn that houses Bryan Becker Clay Werks, with its handmade pottery, paintings, and jewelry (it’s my favorite place to buy earrings).

Continue into Chenequa, where the palatial homes lining Pine Lake make this winding, tree-lined stretch all the more picturesque. If you canoe or kayak, Beaver Lake’s carry-in boat launch, right off 83, offers house gawking and leaf appreciation at a leisurely pace.

Past North Lake, you’ll reach farmland. Don’t be alarmed by goats grazing on grass-topped barns; that’s just Homestead Animal Farm, with its petting zoo, corn maze, and pumpkins.

Shortly after Homestead, go right onto County Line Road/Highway Q. At the intersection of highways Q, E, and K find parking and two entry points for the Ice Age National Scenic Trail. Head to the northern entrance for a moderately hilly hike that hugs the Oconomowoc River before heading to higher (and flatter) ground.

Back on the road, go a half mile east on Q and turn onto Monches Road, a Rustic Road. You’ll find Monches Farm, a gift shop and artful nursery specializing in field-grown perennials and herbs. Monches Road meets St. Augustine Road; turn left and take St. Augustine north (two more Rustic Roads—Emerald and Donegal—are worth side trips) to Holy Hill Road. Make a left toward Holy Hill, the National Shrine of Mary, Help of Christians. At 1,350 feet above sea level, it provides vistas for up to 40 miles, an observation tower, 400 wooded acres to explore, a café with bakery items, and a stunning Neo-Romanesque cathedral—all of which make for a fitting end to this fall pilgrimage.

Northwestern Wisconsin: St. Croix Falls to Cushing

By Carla Waldemar

Celebrated as a National Scenic Riverway, the St. Croix is drop-dead gorgeous.

Pick up maps and brochures and start your 30-mile fall color tour at the Polk County Information Center, located where Highway 8 intersects with Highway 35. Then head north through St. Croix Falls on Highway 87. The panorama of the river—its dam, and the forests on the neighboring shore—is on your left. Hug 87 for about five more miles till River Road forks in from the left. (It’s not well marked; if you cross Big Rock Creek, you’ve gone a couple yards too far.)

For this stretch, kiss civilization goodbye: It’s just you and the blazing woods and the blue, blue water, so close you could almost swan-dive from your car. As the road parts from the river, it passes a secluded cemetery and old-fashioned church on the left.

At 250th Avenue, turn right and trade the river for pastures dotted with grazing Guernseys and cornstalks. Soon you’ll meet up with 87 again at Cushing. Next to the town’s fire station is C Sky Studio and Gallery, where co-owner Susan Noreen displays her paintings, along with a veritable zoo of life-size chain-saw carvings and pottery, glass, and stonework by other local artists.

Heading back south on 87, just before 230th Avenue you’ll see Marshland Farms on the right. Its sign touting “registered Holsteins” understates the vista of scores of black-and-white heifers munching around the pond. Pine, poplar, and maples dot fields anchored by tidy bales of hay.

Eureka Center comes and goes quickly. On the left soon appears Chateau St. Croix Winery & Vineyard, a European-style estate that welcomes visitors for tours and tastings. If you spot another cemetery, you’re three quick roads too far. But Pleasant Valley resting ground, with its spiky cedars and weathered headstones, offers a quiet sanctuary to stretch your legs.

Eight more miles and you’re back in St. Croix Falls, with the memory of this pretty little corner of Wisconsin at its best, ablaze with fall color.