Traveling north of the 45th parallel

The Halfway marker in Wisconsin.
Vonda’s Views
The Trip to the 45th Parallel


The semi spontaneous road trip is how my husband and I have always traveled. We have learned from experience the hard way that if we plan a trip too far ahead of time, something will happen that will snatch the trip out from under us and leave us very disappointed.

We began our married life with spontaneity. He proposed to me over a Chinese fortune cookie and I said yes. Then the idea popped into his head that we should go to Disneyworld for our honeymoon and the wedding date was chosen around the date that we could book a large enough spot for the motor home that my parents owned at the time.

I think from the time of the fortune cookie marriage proposal to the wedding itself was about one month. And so our last minute trip planning life began.

This summer has been no exception. He was able to get a few days vacation from work and my work week was free because of the Fourth of July, the girls were both home so we decided to head north to see as many of his Wisconsin relatives as we could find.

After the stop in Chicago to ride extreme roller coasters we made our way on into the beautiful country that is Wisconsin. Everywhere I looked is like a picture postcard. The classic barns, the rolling farmland, the waterfalls, the scenery is just breathtaking. One of our stops was in the Green Bay area where several of my husbands’ cousins live. We visited Bay Beach amusement park and found out that the Zippin Pippin Roller Coaster from the Memphis Liberty Land is finding a new home there on the banks of the Bay. It will have a beautiful new home and once again be the focal point ride it deserves.

Monday we got up early and loaded the car again and headed on farther north to spend time with the uncles and aunts at their summer cabins. We took a side trip to my the birthplace of my father in law and to an old cemetery where his great grandparents were buried. We stopped at a cheese factory and bought fresh cheese and then moseyed on up past the 45th parallel. I pointed out the marker to the girls that we were halfway between the Equator and the North Pole. There are a couple of markers in Wisconsin to mark that spot. The one we could get to say it’s the Theoretical point. Who cares? I just thought it was cool. I have been to the Equator before. I don’t know that I will make the same statement about the North Pole. I am content with being at the half way mark.

We spent the next couple of days enjoying visiting with his aunts and uncles and just kicking back in the Wisconsin woods. Even the rain was enjoyable. While Scott and the girls enjoyed a boat ride on the river, I stayed at the cabin and watched the deer sauntering through the side yard and seeing the antics of the chipmunks. The different varieties of birds that were at the feeders kept me mesmerized and I really enjoyed the quietness Kiss Lane. As night fell the flying squirrels came out and took their place at the feeders. And as the night grew darker we could see the brilliance of the myriads of stars in the sky.


Our time up north came to an end too quickly and we had to make the long trip back to the heat and humidity and back to the real world of getting up and going to work every day. I wish I could make a career out of sitting in a peaceful cabin the woods, far from the sights and sounds of traffic; a place where I can look out my window and see nature at its best and be inspired and nurtured to create more paintings and writing more stories.

I think I could handle living north of the 45th parallel even in the frigid cold of a Wisconsin winter. I might have to learn to plan ahead a bit better but I could still be spontaneous even in the peacefulness.