On the Road - Wisconsin and Minnesota

We drove out of Madison with very little in a way of a plan other than get to South Dakota in a day or two. We quickly diverted from the freeway and took a series of rolling, scenic, two-lane highways past farms and through small towns.

I was surprised by the array of wildflowers in bloom, lots of Queen Ann’s Lace and Black-Eyed Susans with little purple and orange flowers growing in between.

But of course, the thing that stands out is corn.

Lots and lots of corn. Corn for corn syrup, corn for animal feed, corn for popcorn and corn on the cob. Giant angry-looking machines line the fields, ready to rip the corn cobs from the stalks. Lots of dead corn stalks, dried and blonde in the fields wherever drought conditions exist. I expected more variety from our nation’s breadbasket.