On to Wisconsin

Before leaving the Chicago area, we met another friend for breakfast.  Nancy's family had a house across the lake from my family in Woodland Hills.  We had the chance to meet her husband also.  We had such a great catch-up visit before heading to Wisconsin.

Jerry & Nancy O'Connor with us

Next stop was Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  We got there in time to tour the Miller Brewery.  It was an interesting tour and then it was the tasting room.   

Miller Brewery

The distribution center covers the equivalent of

5 football fields.  Typically, there are about a half

million cases of beer in here!

Up to 200,000 cases are packed daily in the

packaging area

In the brew house, Miller makes its beer, up to 8.5 million barrels annually in Milwaukee alone.  

 Fermenting tanks in brewing area

Kettles in brew house

The historic Miller cave, a restored portion of the

original brewery where beer was stored before the

invention of mechanical refrigeration.

The next morning we took walked the River Walk along the Milwaukee River.  We found the Bronze Fonz and had to pose with him!

 The Bronze Fonz

 Milwaukee River Walk

Draw bridge along the River Walk

Our view at lunch

Here are some other pictures from our drive around town.  There were so many nice houses and buildings that it was hard to choose!

 Downtown

Basilica of St Josaphat - it was such an overcast

morning.  Such a beautiful building.

Miller Park - Home of the Milwaukee Brewers

Mosque in Milwaukee

Pabst Mansion

Another part of the Pabst Mansion

Milwaukee

City Hall

The other side of City Hall

Milwaukee

The harbor in Sheboygan was our next stop.  We walked out along Lake Michigan and watched the fishermen, boats and jet skis.  At the end of the pier was the Sheboygan Breakwater Lighthouse.

Sheboygan Harbor

 The Pier

The Sheboygan Breakwater Lighthouse

The Lottie Cooper was a 3-masted schooner that was built in 1976 and was 131-feet long.  In April 1894, it was caught in a storm while carrying 230,000 board feet of elm lumber and capsized.  Of the 6 crew members, 5 of them were rescued. While building the harbor, the schooner was found and salvaged.

The Lottie Cooper

The Lottie Cooper

The last stop was at the World's Largest Freedom Symbol - a HUGE flag!  The flagpole is 400 feet tall and the flag measures 60 feet high by 120 feet long.  I just couldn't get it all in one picture!  Conrad looks like an ant at the bottom of the pole.

 Conrad at the base of the pole

The flag

The pond near the flag

We cruised on through Green Bay and decided to call it a day in Oconto, Wisconsin.  We had decided to stay in mom and pop motels along the way when possible.  I have to say, this one was very old but not too bad.  It was clean and the bed was comfortable.  The next morning we stopped at McDonald's for breakfast and there were 4 people sitting at a table near us and they had brought their own flyswatter and were killing flies at the table!  I swear, the fly is the state insect here!  So many of them. 

Now, on to Michigan.  We're only 24 miles away!