Pretty cool little excursion in LaCrosse. Easy drive up. Not a lot of signs alerting which…read moreparking lot is for the highest vantage point so my tip to you: drive through the open gates and drive until you see a parking lot with a gazebo-esque type outdoor building and that will be the highest point. Quick walk out to the edge. Some wild flowers added to the experience. It was a beautiful morning. Very clear and we were able to see the Mississippi river, Minnesota and of course Wisconsin. Worth taking the half hour to take in this view.

10/14/23 - we were in LaCrosse and saw that there was an overview of LaCrosse from the bluff. You…read moreneed to drive up a short distance to an overview that gives you a great panoramic view of the city below. In addition you can see the Mississippi River w/LaCrosse on one side & Minnesota on the other side. Such a beautiful overview of the town, trees, hills, Mississippi River, train tracks & an eagle soaring above the cities on the wind currents (so cool & majestic) Granddads Bluff is a short run uphill to an overlook going through a hairpin turn on the way to the overlook. Great way to spend a few minutes seeing the sights below w/the beginning of the fall colors. It would have been nicer coloration in a few more days

So, the house, what you can see of it: 5 stars. It's gorgeous and everything is well preserved…read more Why the 2 stars though? Three reasons: 1. I would post pics showing what it looks like but no photography is allowed. I thought the one woman was going to bat my phone out of my hand when I took it out to take a pic. It is 2019; 80 year old grandmothers have smartphones with cameras. If it's about flash photography, say so and let me take pics without the flash. Otherwise, a restriction on photography gets you an immediate downvote in my book. 2. You see three rooms and you can't even go in and look around, it's all roped off. 3. None of the guides knew anything beyond their script. Anytime anyone asked a question they said they didn't know the answer. Why are you working here if you don't know half the questions people are asking? Beautiful house, what you can see of it. I got in free with a tour but based on my time there today would never pay to go inside.

Fantastic tour, house is preserved so well and you can tell the staff/volunteers have a lot of…read morerespect for its history. Well worth the ticket cost. Tour probably an hour or longer and so much detail!!!

This is a small regional museum, well worth the one dollar suggested admission. The entryway is…read morelined with a display of various items from a general store, with then and now pricing; items from the local barber; medicines; and a large dollhouse donated by a local. Once you get into the main museum, you'll learn about the local history, which is super interactive (open this window! pull this lever! push this button!) in a way I imagine keeps the children engaged but isn't annoying for the adults. The current exhibit is favorite toys, as voted on by the citizens of Sparta, with plenty of examples, including one or two you can actually play with (I have my own Magic 8 Ball, thanks). There is a model railroad which runs around a Sparta of yesteryear (including a tiny model of the charming Wegner grotto); a giant exhibit of someone's photos of a trip out west taken with a stereographic camera, which you can peer into - like a stereoopticon or a View-Master; mini-bios on local luminaries including a composer and a co-founder of the National Organization for Women, various farm implements with a video showing how they were used; photos of various local towns, then and now; even a chance to sort "cranberries" by how they bounce off a tiny bucket elevator. Maybe 40 minutes tops, with perhaps 7 exhibit stations, but a lot of fun. One piece of knowledge I came away with: the museum itself is at "Four Corners," the only corner in Wisconsin with a building in the National Register of Historic Places on each corner. Fun!

Awesome local museum. The young county historian was so incredibly friendly as we entered. He was…read moremore than happy to give us a quick overview of the ground floor museum and explained the featured exhibits. I came across an interesting print piece on display and had a question about it. The historian was stumped, but he immediately got on the computer to find me the answer in his thirst for knowledge. The museum is well-maintained and shows pride in its local community. As we finished up walking around the museum, our friendly historian recommended other local historical sites in the area to see. He recommended the Wegner grotto, and based off his description of the site, we were charmed. (We did go check out the grotto immediately afterwards.) Admission is free for the local museum on the ground floor. Admission to the second floor Space and Bike museum is $3.

In most places when you will cross the Mississippi River and journey from one state to another…read more Here in La Crosse, this section of the river is entirely in Wisconsin and you won't be at the border to Minnesota for another mile or so. There are two spans here, with the upriver (westbound) being the Cass Street Bridge and the downriver (eastbound) is the Cameron Avenue Bridge. They connect downtown La Crosse with Barron Island. It is only when you are on the La Crosse West Channel Bridge and you go from Barron Island to cross into La Crescent Minnesota. The Cass Street Bridge (the one that I drove heading west) opened in 1939 and replaced a swing bridge that was damaged in 1935. It is a cantilever bridge 17 panel rivet-connected warren through truss with a a total length of 2532 feet and a width of 30 feet. There is 67 feet of clearance below to the Mississippi. It is paired with the Cameron Avenue bridge that is more modern and opened in 2004. If you're here, do check out the deck truss approach spans which are curved. Another interesting feature is the stairways that are midway along the approach spans at each end of the bridge and allow pedestrians to climb up to the bridge sidewalk. The western stairway includes a crossover stairway that passes under the deck truss allowing pedestrians to switch which sidewalk they are walking on without walking across the roadway. [Review 20711 overall - 280 in Wisconsin - 1692 of 2023.]

Looking for a super cool spot to hangout for a bit and watch the spillway then you've found it!…read more So one early morning adventure we found ourselves here to watch and listen to the spillway as we waited for our friends to go start our breakfast adventures with. The spot we were at was across from the spillway it had a good amount of parking places and a few benches even though we were here early morning there was still a handful of people here some fishing and some launching their boat off for a day of fun! We pretty much just chilled here for a bit because it was peaceful with the sound of the water crashing and just the beautiful scenery it was definitely an awesome way to start the day! Overall this is a dam so you know what to expect it's just a chill spot to pass the time or fish either way it was definitely cool finding this and I hope to be back again sometime!

Don't blink...you'll drive right past it. There is a small area to park, just careful pulling out.read more

Great piece of local history! Worth taking the time to stop and read about the cut...but be…read morecareful of you walk out into tje road to get a better picture because the xars can come up fast!

We are in the Dells quite often and were looking for different things to do so we decided to check…read moreout Baraboo and came across the mansion and brewery. Walking into the brewery was awesome, such a cool place and quite large. The girl at the spot were I believe you can order food wasn't too friendly but the bartender was awesome! Bartender was super friendly, I wish I could remember his name. We told him how we were looking for things to do and he was more than happy to write down some recommendations for us. I thought that was super nice because I feel like sometimes, at least in the Dells area, it seems like they get tired of us tourists and aren't always as friendly as I feel they should be considering they know they're working in a tourist area. We happened to be sitting next to the lady that does the tours so we thought, awesome, we love seeing old buildings and hearing the history so we signed up! It's $20 per person and about 50-60 mins. It was super cool to see, informative, the lady was friendly, and answered any questions we had. It was pretty amazing to hear that people actually live on the 4th floor, I wasn't expecting that for some reason. After the tour was over she played the large organ for us which was great. We sat down for another beer, listened to the awesome music the bartender was playing and set up our next tour at the Driftless Glen distillery. This was on our list plus it was one of the recommendations from the bartender. If your in the area and looking for something different to do, I highly recommend checking this place out!

This was a beautiful history lesson. The tour guide, Kim was very knowledgeable. I appreciated that…read moreshe included my 3 children in the conversations by addressing them, talking with them, and answering their questions. The house is beautiful and has so many gorgeous rooms and architecture. The tour ends in the brewery where Kim plays the calliope. She also offered the adults a free sample of beer from the Ringling brewery. Tour took about an hour and was well worth the time and money. Highly recommend.

This bridge over the Mississippi River is the traditional delineator that splits the United States…read morein half. Yes, the Mississippi starts somewhere up not too far north from here in Minnesota at Lake Itasca and flows south to New Orleans. This is where the east meets the west in the north. This bridge carries Interstate 90 and joins La Crosse Wisconsin to Dresbach Minnesota. It was fully opened to traffic in October 2016, replacing a previous 1967 plate girder bridge. The bridge consists of a pair of parallel, concrete box girder structures over the main river channel and precast concrete girder structures over the back channels. The bridge has two lanes in each direction and includes 18 feet of shoulders inside and outside. The bridge is rather boring with few features or accoutrements but it gets the job done. There is no toll in either direction. I've also crossed the Mississippi in Cairo https://www.yelp.com/biz/i-57-bridge-cairo?hrid=JF0q8MwMYungXJVSOhfg3g, Memphis https://www.yelp.com/biz/memphis-and-arkansas-bridge-marion?hrid=09JRv_jh6CzQLjxU6X4ACg, Greenville https://www.yelp.com/biz/greenville-bridge-lake-village?hrid=WGXvzX4AagbXz9LLRId8Pg and Vicksburg https://www.yelp.com/biz/mississippi-river-bridge-vicksburg?hrid=0YJFnhUafyNWCYBI-q1jSQ. [Review 17169 overall - 181 in Wisconsin - 686 of 2022.]