Outdoors On Edge
Located on a peninsula between Green Bay and Lake Michigan, Door County, Wisconsin offers a beautiful shoreline, parks and beaches galore, and towns brimming with ice cream shops, antiques and knickknacks, and quaint artistry.
Door County is every retired, older woman’s dream and one my mother-in-law has been wanting to show me forever. Last week, her dream — and gosh, dare I say mine, too — came true when I finally made my way north to experience what is known as the Cape Cod of the Midwest.
My wife, Cheryl, mother-in-law, Bonnie, and Tom hit the peninsula last Monday afternoon. Bonnie is a widow and Tom is her man and although they are very committed to one another, this offers him no legal family standing and is thus just referred to as Tom or Bonnie’s Tom.
As a Texan, I was immediately taken by the lush forests, beautiful water and place names that I couldn’t pronounce. The latter became somewhat of a sport to my travel companions and to everyone I met who found it hilarious to hear me try to successfully enunciate words like Kewaunee, Potawatomi, Waukesha, Oconomowoc and Menomonie.
NOTE: I never said any of these correctly.
The four of us drove through small town after small town and stopped to walk main street after main street. Most of these communities were similar to Fredericksburg in that they offered shopping, dining, wineries, breweries and history upon a family and pedestrian friendly thoroughfare.
Unlike Fredericksburg, no one jaywalked, I saw no bridal party packs sashaying about in white cowboy boots, shorter-thanshort miniskirts, and wearing sashes denoting their upcoming wedding party assignment, and public consumption of alcohol is frowned upon.
Despite this archaic last difference on Door County’s part, I was able to sample a few local favorites such as Point Light, Spotted Cow, a couple different varieties of Leinenkugel’s, Pabst Blue Ribbon and Miller High Life. I liked the last two best. Go figure.
In the afternoon, we jutted over to Toft Point State Natural Area where we hiked the short twomile trail. This easy walk took us through a boreal forest and several beautiful meadows before reaching a scenic overlook of Lake Michigan.
According to Cheryl, we saw yellow lady slippers, pink and purple lupines, daisies, ferns and columbines. According to me, we saw trees and flowers.
That evening, we headed to Coyote Roadhouse on beautiful Lake Kangaroo. The lake is so named because it supposedly resembles a kangaroo from above. Although this is a great origin story, I’m not sure how the folks who named it Cangaroo Lake in the 1820s were able to see what a 700-acre lake could look like from high up in the air. My guess is that the lake was originally called something else until a Texan came by and mispronounced it so badly that the locals went with kangaroo just to make fun of the guy.
The Roadhouse features a ton of local favorites and over 300 varieties of beers. I started with a Great Lakes Mexican Lager. This beer tasted like no Mexican beer I’d ever had, and I suspect it was actually just what some local thought a Mexican beer should taste like. I switched from that to local favorite Miller Lite then scarfed down a fried perch sandwich and onion rings.
After a few more beers, I got a call from Captain Spenser Samplawski from Big Bite Adventures. (No, I can’t pronounce his last name either.) I was to fish with him the next day and he was calling with some last-minute instructions. He said I was to dress warm, bring rain gear, and meet him at Bailey’s Harbor at 3:55.
“Wait, we’re not going out until tomorrow afternoon?” I asked.
“No. In the morning. We leave at four. Be here by 3:55. We should get into some salmon and steelhead pretty quick. Maybe be off the water by 6:30.”
Captain Spenser might not have said that last part. Truth be told, I didn’t hear much after the be here at 3:55 in the morning part. It was just too much of a shock.
Young is a Fredericksburg resident and avid outdoorsman whose work appears in the paper, Rock & Vine magazine, and other outdoor publications. Contact him at gayne@gaynecyoung. com. He’d love to hear from you.
