Escape room? Check. Geocaches? Check. Regional attractions? Check. Looks like it was a typical three day weekend for Christina and me.
This weekend we visited southwest Wisconsin, staying about 45 minutes south of Madison in a town called Dodgeville. Being an hour away from a city that’s not particularly big, I was surprised how much there was to do around the area. Christina and I only barely managed to scrape the surface.
Friday evening we hit an escape room at Escape in Time in Madison. We had visited this venue before on our trip to Minneapolis but a booking issue prevented us from playing (a blessing in disguise, since we avoided part of a terrible blizzard by hitting the road earlier). We really enjoyed our visit; the Water Landing game is a very unique theme, and the room had everything we like in a game.
On Saturday, we explored the town of New Glarus, famous for its Swiss culture and brewery. For puzzles, we found a few Geocaches in the area (New Glarus itself only has one, but it was a fun, quick multi-stage cache requiring some big tools and decent hand-eye coordination) and hunted down every cow statue in town.
Sunday we visited the Mid-Continent Railway Museum up toward the Dells, getting to see some wonderful mountainous scenery which is uncommon to the midwest. We also passed by a few attractions we flagged for a return trip like House on the Rock and the Frank Lloyd Wright exhibit.
The train museum was a blast, especially being able to climb all over hundred-year-old cars and imagining the days when these train cars were the best way to get from place to place. We even took a ride on an old model of diesel engine to see how much things have changed between 1910 and now. It was a very neat experience!
The Wisconsin Dells draws many visitors toward southwest Wisconsin, but the area holds many treasures which are less well-known. The next time we visit, Christina and I plan to take advantage of one of the area’s bed & breakfasts.
The weekend is far from over, and we’re likely going to tackle at least one more escape room before all is said and done. Also, at eight days, my dad and I have tied our longest streak of days with a geocache, so I wouldn’t mind nabbing one more to set a brand new record.
All in all, it was very nice learning of some new treasures less than three hours from home. I hope you had an excellent Labor Day weekend as well.
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