Wisconsin Road Trip / Menomonie & Pepin
Driving from Beaver Lake, WI to Wabasha, MN | Elk Mound Hill Castle | Devil’s Punchbowl Preserve in Menomonie | Laura Ingalls Wilder Birthplace in Pepin, WI | Kruger Campground in MN | May 2024
After enjoying a few days of slower paced travel in the UP and Northern Wisconsin, it was time to make some more progress with our drive South to Iowa. We didn’t have much planned for this stretch of drive, but at least we would make some progress to one of our goals by visiting several new Wisconsin counties. Our morning started out with our longest stretch of drive, going from our campground at Beaver Lake all the way South to Elk Mound Hill Castle in Elk Mound, WI. We drove up the steep hill to the small lot and got out to walk around the summit, and Curtis and I took turns climbing the steps up to the top of the castle for a better view.
We had a quick lunch in the van, then continued our drive heading West. Just outside of Menomonie, we made another stop at Devil’s Punchbowl Preserve. Curtis had visited this place before we were married with his family and remembered it to be an easy stop and worth the walk, as well as one of the first places he went letterboxing. We walked down the steps to reach the side of the creek, then walked around the corner to take in the tall waterfall and the green mossy rocks. There wasn’t much water flowing today, but it was still worth the short stop.
Next, we drove further South to Pepin to see a historic site that I was particularly excited about: the birthplace of Laura Ingalls Wilder! The site has a small pull off on the side of county road CC between Lund and Barry Corner. There are a few signs here, as well as a replica of the log cabin. We enjoyed walking around, taking in the view, and checking out the cabin. There’s also a museum South of here in the town of Pepin, but since we can’t do museums with Charlotte we didn’t visit today — just seeing the actual location was our goal! This site joins our growing list of Laura Ingalls Wilder historic places that we’ve visited (Little House on the Prairie in Kansas, De Smet in South Dakota, Plum Creek in Minnesota, Burr Oak in Iowa [Jess only], and Almanzo Wilder’s home in Upstate NY) and now we only have one site to visit (that we know of) in Missouri! This site is also now on my growing list of places I’ve watched Eras Tour live streams from. I’m sure Laura would have understood. (It was Paris night 1, iykyk)
Once we were finished at the cabin, it was time to wrap up our time in Wisconsin. We drove down to Nelson, then crossed the Mississippi into Wabasha, MN. It was a beautiful river crossing, with high bluffs on the Minnesota side that is common in the Driftless region. Our campsite for tonight was a short drive from here, in Kruger Campground off of MN-60. As soon as we arrived, we were informed by a park ranger that it was morrell season, so naturally Curtis started looking, and happened to find some in our campsite!
After we were set up in our spot, we went for a short hike through the park. We walked down the long set of stairs from the campground down to the county park, then followed the stream up to a spot that was supposedly a nice overlook of the area. However, after walking a ways we found that the end of the trail was very overgrown, and wary of ticks and poison ivy, I decided to skip the end and let Charlotte lead me back the way we came. Curtis went up the rest of the way and enjoyed the views. This whole area was noticeably greener than where we had been up North, and it officially felt like spring, with summer well on its way!
