Holmen WI - 2018

After Preston MN, we headed to Holmen, WI to see our friends Casey and Mo.  Their son Kyle and our son Michael used to be the best of buds.  Maybe they still are, but just don't talk to each other anymore.  But what do I know.  We are still friends with Casey and Mo (yes even after this visit!).   The initial plan was to stay in their driveway, but since we were not really setup for dry camping yet, we opted to stay at a campground, actually "Whispering Pines" campground.  It was about 15 minutes from their house.

The night we got there, they were kind enough to take us out to dinner.  The restaurant we went to had a "Fish Fry" on Fridays and guess what?  It's Friday!.  We all got the fish fry, Terry got the healthier side of it, with grilled fish.  The rest of us went for the good stuff.  Fried fish!...That's right, I got fish and chips.  I like fish and chips.  After dinner, they came by to check out our rig and have a drink or two.

The next morning, Casey had scheduled a pancake breakfast at a farm.  This was cool, you get to eat and checkout the workings of a dairy farm.  The first stop after getting a ticket of course was to the cheese curds...fried cheese curds that is!  Terry thought they were a little salty.  I thought they just tasted good.  Of course if you fry it, it will taste good.  I let Don G. know I was having some.  He likes cheese curds and I had to rub it in.  😋  Then off to the pancakes and sausage.  YUMMMM!   They even had milk.  It was in a small cardboard container like you got in school.  I would of thought you  could get it fresh, from the cow, (after they chilled it of course) at a dairy farm.

After our bellies got full, off we go to check out the farm.  Well a building or two at least.  Most of the cows didn't care if you walked by them while they ate, but if you went towards them, off they go into a corner.  I wonder if they thought we were there to eat them?  I guess we will never know.  We did see a couple of chocolate milk cows also.  You would think they would have more of them since there is a lot of chocolate milk in the stores.  Maybe they don't use their milk for cheese so they can use it all just for milk...yeah, that must be it.

The farm had some game booths that we stopped at.  Between the 4 of us, we "Won" 3 blocks of cheese and a pencil.  You always won something.  It was a good deal...that didn't cost anything and the cheese would have cost more than our tickets.  After checking out a few buildings (barns), we hopped aboard a wagon and went for a ride around the farm.  There was a 8 year old, telling us about the farm.  You know he knew a lot, but never milked a cow by hand.  You would have thought his dad would have taught him the basics, before the modern way.  I would have at least.  Anyway, I think he said that they had to do something like 3 cows every ten minutes, or 90 seconds to get the tittie suckers on the three cows.  I am sure I am right with all the info, or totally wrong.  But it's my story and I can have cheese curds if I want to.  We also stopped at the place where they monitored the feedings of the young cows.  If the cows are not eating that much, they try and find out why.  They also monitor other things that I don't remember.  They did talk about what each stomach (cows have 4 of them) are used for too.  The last place we visited was the barn with the baby calves.  One of them loved to be petted.  Oh, did I tell you, when we got to Casey and Mo's, It was pouring down rain?  well now I did, and we got  wet...again.  At least it stopped when we got to the farm.  Here are some pictures of that adventure.  We also picked up a brochure about it.  Here that is.

After the farm, we split up and Terry and I went back to the RV to let the dog out.  That afternoon, we headed back to their house.  It was almost baseball time!  Casey scored some tickets to a minor league game.  Not just any tickets, these were like box tickets with food and drink included.

When we arrived at the game, we settled into our seats and ordered a drink and some food...well all of us but Casey held off for a while.  I guess she doesn't know Terry and I and how we like the rain...or more like the rain likes us.  We also received a bobblehead of Mason McCoy.  I guess he was the MVP in 2015.  Anyway, we snapped some pictures with the mascot (I guess) and chowed down on our food and drinks.  We almost got to see the whole first inning of the game, before the sky opened up and started dropping dogs and cats with an occasional elephant.  Of course that stopped the game (The lightning helped with that too.), so Mo and I went to get the car and then get the girls.  We were able to snap a few pictures of it before the rain out.  Here they are.  Once we got to the car, we saw that we were blocked in.  No way out of our parking spot.  we could back up into a field but there wasn't an exit from the field.  Luckily another person that was parked in the same row was able to get out which gave us the opening that we needed to escape.  It didn't take but 5 minutes or so before they showed up.  Thank god for that one.  So off we go to do something else since the game eventually was rescheduled for another day.  We ended up going to the movies and saw "Oceans 8".   Mo and I enjoyed the movie, Terry enjoyed the nap and Casey enjoyed some food.  It rained all night, which kinda sucks in an RV.  Rain can become very loud in an RV and that makes the dog a very unhappy camper.

The next day, it sayed dry for us.  Which was good since we headed to a winery to sample their goods, and I mean goods!.  That night, Mo treated us to pizza on the grill.  We never had pizza on the grill before and I wish I did, because it was better than the wine! (Terry would say the opposite though).  After that, we bid goodbye...not really because I don't really know what that means, so I just said bye and see you when we come back to the area.  Maybe later this year, or sometime within the next 5 decades or so.

One thing we noticed while here and at Preston was the amount of golden eagles flying around.  That was cool since I like eagles.

It was good to hook up with Casey and Mo and see Kyle and Luke (their children that are almost all grown up or is all grown up (Kyle)).  Now it's time to move on to Michigan.  Our next stop is Gladstone, MI.