This Is Drivel

Tag: travel

  • flashback – The Pennine Way ’86

    flashback – The Pennine Way ’86

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    I took a week of leave to hike the Pennine Way while I was stationed in the United Kingdom. Read.

  • flashback – first tent

    flashback – first tent

    I spent a few hours yesterday afternoon cleaning up the mess of odds and ends which had piled up on my basement workbench. Amongst the detritus, I found four aluminum tent pegs. They appeared to be the tent pegs that belonged to a tent I bought while I was still in high school in, I Read.

  • IAT Valley View Segment – 10/14/25

    IAT Valley View Segment – 10/14/25

    Today’s hike of the Valley View Segment of the Ice Age Trail didn’t go exactly as expected. My plan was to drop my bicycle off at the southern end of the segment where the trail emerged onto Mill Town Road, then drive to the trailhead on Timber Lane a few miles northwest, where I would Read.

  • IAT Cross Plains/Andersen Preserve – 10/08/25

    IAT Cross Plains/Andersen Preserve – 10/08/25

    By 1:30 pm I was done walking the Pine Road loop and I still wasn’t ready to head home, so I went for a hat trick — three hikes in one day. According to my guidebook, there was a nearby hike on the IAT I could walk as a loop, so I headed south to Read.

  • IAT Cedar Lake Project – 10/2/25 and 10/3/25

    IAT Cedar Lake Project – 10/2/25 and 10/3/25

    I’ve hiked many trails where stepping stones had been arranged to cross a small stream or a shallow river and when I did, I wondered how much effort and ingenuity it took to move those big stones into place. This week I found out. The Ice Age Trail Alliance was cutting a new trail through Read.

  • Campout Plan B

    Campout Plan B

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    I was lucky enough to spend two days with some old friends from high school. Roy is an old hiking buddy from way back. We’ve been to the Porcupine Mountains and to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. I’ve seen him two or three times since I returned to Wisconsin, most recently about a year ago Read.

  • Hartman Creek State Park

    Hartman Creek State Park

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    I hung my hammock between two tall pines at Hartman Creek State Park, looking forward to a good night’s sleep and a view of the stars. Didn’t get either. Someone down the road had their radio going all night, so I drifted in and out of sleep to the tunes they shared with everyone else Read.

  • Lake of the Pines / Hartman Creek State Park

    Lake of the Pines / Hartman Creek State Park

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    I slept pretty well at Lake of the Pines State Park, considering I had to sleep in my van. I was hoping to sleep in a hammock, but I was not willing to brave attacks from the squadrons of mosquitoes that would have zeroed in on me while I was hanging it, so I simply Read.

  • Lake of the Pines State Campground

    Lake of the Pines State Campground

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    I spent the night at Lake of the Pines State Campground, in spite of the best efforts of a biblical swarm of mosquitoes to drive me away. Lake of the Pines is about a four-hour drive from Madison if you don’t stop. I stopped more than once, so it was more like four-and-a-half. I arrived Read.

  • Vacation in California 2013

    Vacation in California 2013

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    I didn’t take my phone to Isle Royale because it wouldn’t work there, except as a camera, but I didn’t want to use it as a camera because it’s a pretty old phone. I was absolutely certain the battery wouldn’t last five days. Even if I brought a power bank, I was pretty sure my Read.

photo of the author and the author's best friend