Road Trip: Ohio. Again...
Day 4: Friday, April 14, 2023 - Madison, WI
Day's statistics:
Weather: upper 70s
Steps: Steve 14,053; Linda 13,265
Travel: 112 miles
Breakfast was light continental.
This was our third full day of the trip, and today we will visit our third capital.
After breakfast we checked out and headed to the state house.
The city skyline and the capital on approach.
A little closer.
We parked the car in the garage, and started our couple block walk to the capital. On the way, we passed by this little
"free library" that was in front of a church. That resembled the free library. Or did the free library resemble the church?!!?
We took our selfie right away this day.
A couple more shots of the capital, first from what we thought was the front entrance, then from what was the entrance side.
A close-up of the dome statue, which stands fifteen feet tall and weighs 6,000 pounds.
Wisconsin, in native American, means "water runs through the red rock.
Again there was no security at this capital. We walked in and headed right to the Tours and Information desk.
First things first, our caopital stamp.
We were told that a school group, including exchange students, was starting a tour soon. So we used the restroom
and waited the few minutes for the class to gather and get started.
The capital has 43 different types of stone.
The dome, one of the largest in the US, with a close-up of the center.
Looking up at the second floor.
Ever watch a TV show and, let's say, there are two NCIS Agents in a building and one talks into their communication device
and says "They went out the north exit." and wonder who knows and how the hell do they know what side is the north side?
The state building solves that problem. This was the first time that we can remember seeing this sort of thing. Off the
bottom floor of the rotunda there were eight hallways in a wheel spoke sort of pattern. The lights on the ceiling at the
beginning of each hallway had the direction the hallway faced, and the street (on every other one) that the hallway led to.
Fantastic idea.
The capital itself faces a southeasterly direction - pointing toward the sun, as well as DC.
The architect of the captial was George Post. The building was constructed in from 1906 - 1917, after a fire in 1904.
At 9:00 our tour group started its trek, and at the first flight of stairs, the docent pointed out this fossil in the
stonework of the staircase. She said there were quite a few like fossils throughout the facility.
We were at the entrance to the railroad room and this is a view across the capital like we had in Saint Paul.
A close-up of a piece of the architecture near the supreme court.
A wing skylight with some ceiling artwork.
This was called the railroad meeting room because railroad taxes paid for the construction of the capital, and
this was their "reward".
While marble on the wall, while not atypical, is unique here because it is a double-mirror of itself - meaning that
the left and right halves, and thje top and bottom halves are mirrors of each other.
Looking down at the rotunda and lowest leve, from the second floor.
Looking back at the supreme court. The figure above the door is a badger - Wisconsin is the "Badger State".
The senate chamber.
There are 33 senators, and the majority party sits on the outer rows because they have more seats.
The president of the senate's seat and mural.
The chamber skylight.
The chamber clock.
We finished in the senate and walked over to the house chamber.
There are 99 representatives in the house. In this state, the republicans always sit on the left, the democrats on
the right, regardless of who has the majority.
The speaker of the house's seat, and mural above.
Here is a closer-up of the mural.
Speaking of the mural... The story is that when the mural was originally completed, there was a confederate solder (?)
on the right. It was replaced with a badger because, "Badger State". However, supposedly there is a ghost of the
solder that is still somewhat visible in the painting. While we don't have all the exact details, I tried to outline
the general form of part of the soldiers figure - the hat, sash, sholder and arm (it was clearer to us when the docent
was pointing it out to the group).
The chamber skylight - the largest skylight in the capital.
The electronic voting system, installed in 1917, is the nation's first electronic voting system.
We finished in the house, and returned to the rotunda.
There were mosaics in the corners of the rotunda, and they are made of more than 10,000 pieces each.
Looking down at the floor of the lowest level.
Wisconsin's replica of the liberty bell.
In the Governor's wing is this 1200 pound badger sculpture, made of metal from canons from the Spanish-American
War in Cuba, was once on the USS Wisconsin. His nose is rubbed for good luck.
We entered the Governor's conference room. It is still used.
The ceiling (the saying reads "Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness".
The class we were touring with sat at the conference table as if they were having a meeting.
A group of US and state flags, probably used for various presentations / press conferences / photo ops.
The conference room sans the class.
The hallway approaching the governor's office was lined with the eleven flags of the indigenous nations of Wisconsin.
As with Saint Paul, we were with a class group, and they get to go on the roof. So we got to too.
We first had to go up a few flights of stairs.
We got to the top of the stairs, walked down a short hallway, and onto the roof to look around.
A couple individual shots to show a little more detail.
The capital sits on a portion of land that separates Lake Mendota and Lake Monona - each visiible in the pictures above -
called an isthmus.
The panaramic has Lake Mendota in the background while the picture with the fountain has Lake Monona in the background.
The statues around the capital, taken from a few feet away, rather than a few hundred feet away like they usually are.
Our ten or so minute visit to the roof was over, and we headed back inside.
Some glass flooring.
Looking across the capital.
We returned to the Railroad Room to get a better picture of the fossil in the stone on the wall (in the back left corner
of the wider Railrood Room image above).
The other two of the four mosaics in the rotunda, and a close-up of one section to shwo the mosaic-ness.
Before we departed, we stopped and picked up a postcard - they did not have shot glasses.
Our capital visit and tour were complete, time to head to our next step.
On the way to the car, we grabbed this shot, looking into the sun.
A few more feet away was one of the foreign exchange students. We talked to her for a little bit and learned that she
misses her home and family but really likes her host family. She was a track and field athlete and did the shotput
and discus - but based on her slender physique, I had guess sprinter. We wished her well and continued on.
On the walk to the car, we came across this what I guess can be called a sculpture or perhaps a work of art. It was on
pedestals, but it had to be cropped because there was a consruction fence in the foreground.
This is a bank, with a lot of resemblence to the Flatiron Building in New York.
We returned to the car and headed toward our next stop about a mile down the road.
Our next stop was the Chazen Museum of Art, which was essentiaully on the campus of the Univeristy of Wisconsin.
Out front on the sidewalk was this wooden skull sculpture.
The museum had a number of different exhibits, including Asian and glass. We toured the entire facilty, but,
as always, found some works more interesting than others. Here they are with no specially commentary unless needed.
Not necessarily presented in the order they were viewed.
A collection of Netsuke, similar to what we saw when we were in
Toledo in 2019, with a couple close-ups
of the more interesting pieces. Remember that these figurines are only a couple inches tall.
Some pottery.
Art glass.
Paintings.
The Colonade at Versailles by Giovanni Boldini.
Going From The Mill by Grandma Moses
This work, The Fall of Novgorod by Klaudii Vasilievich Lebedev, is interesting on its own, but looking at
a close up of the woman's face, it is very striking - the scour on her face is so... disturbing too.
Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol (we saw a LOT more Warhol's at the Warhol Museum in
Pittsburgh).
A collection of Madonnas, and Hendrik Coiff of Gorinchem, by various artists.
While this is still the "paintings" section, this is a painted bottle called Woman Bottle by René Magritte.
And this is Inspiration by René Magritte, which is a painting that includes the painted bottle above.
So it is artwork of artwork.
An ecclectic set of other pieces.
When passing from one wing to another, we passed by these four cute kids hanging out in this artistic seat, presented in both
color, and black and white (because I thought the image might look artistic too).
Another ecclectic set of other pieces, all from Linda's phone and mostly from the last wing visited.
We visited the two exhibits on the first level and in all, spent more than an hour and a half in the museum.
It was rapidly approaching lunch time so we headed out toward the restaurant which happened to be a few blocks away on th eother side of
the garage where the car was parked. When we exited the museum, we found bus loads of band members playing on the sidewalk in front of
the museum. While we would like to have thought they were playing in celebration of our visit, it turns out that there was some sort of
something going on, but it seemed that the Chancellor of the College was being installed and he gave a speech. Or something like that.
So rather than deal with the crowd, we walked around the back of the museum and popped out across the street from
the parking garage where our car was. We walked up to the street that the band was playing on - though past the
band - and started heading away toward the restaurant.
Lunch was Russian - yes, Russian - at Paul's Pel'meni.
Their menu is very basic - not that there is anything wrong with it. You get dumplings. That's it.
And you can select what type of filling you want, and what you want on them.
Linda had a half order of mixed with the works. We thought it was going to be a mix of beef and potato together,
but it was some beef and some potato.
I had a full order of the beef, also with the works.
This meal was certainly something different. The restaurant was rather busy too. You place your order, pay, and then
either sit at a table to wait - and presumably eat-in - or stand around and wait and take your meal to go. We enjoyed
our meal but will know that it isn't for everyone. We tried yet another nationality and were pleasantly surprised.
We departed Paul's and started our half-dozen walk back to the parking garage.
Being fans of the TV show Grimm, we found this useful for Linda to post to the Grimm Facebook® group.
We got into the car, paid our parking fee, and... oh, we need a shot glass.
We Googled where we might be able to go, and found the Univeristy Bookstore was on the corner around the block. We pulled
up, temporarily illegally parked while I ran - literally - in to find a shot glass. It was plain but was a Wisconsin glass
and not a University of Wisconsin glass - there was ONE state one, but 5 or 6 UoW ones. I paid and was out the door in less
than five minutes. Or so it felt. Linda was left in the car with the key so if she HAD to move it, she could.
We had a fifteen minute drive back past the capital and onto the Olbrich Botanical Gardens.
I didn't get a picture of the front for some reason - and only realize that now while typing this.
We walked the property and saw as much as we could. Like the Elizabeth Park rose garden we saw in
Hartford last year, this place must be
spectacular. There were flowers and trees in bloom, some not, and some structures throughout. We enjoyed what we could.
Most will be presented without commentary unless necessary.
In the farthest section of the park was the Thai Pavillion and Garden. A bridge has to be crossed to get to this section.
The pavillion was undergoing minor repairs so we could only walk around it. There were a couple
of pools in front of the pegoda, and a mallard was hanging out when we were passing by.
There was a raised platform in the middle of the park that allowed for viewing from higher up (obviously...). There wasn't too much
more too see from up there at this time of year.
After a little more than an hour, we departed the gardens.
Though it was early, we headed to our hotel in Racine, a Comfort Inn.
We didn't quite do as much on this day as we did others, or even could have done, but a break every once
in a while is not necessarily a bad thing. So we started the hour and a half drive to Milwaukee.
We stopped at Metro Market to pick up a dinner snack - wine and a couple salads. We also got a Starbucks® in the store too.
Another ten or so minutes later we passed by a huge - HUGE - solar array field that we were just barely able to get a picture
of. It is through the trees in the middle. It could be the sixty-thousand panel array, the largest in the county.
We were able to spend some time switching clothes in the suitcases as we started putting two to three days of clothes
in our carry-ons so that we could leave the larger checked bags in the back of the car for ease.
At about 7:00, we had our dinner, splitting the wine (the same vintner as the previous night) and salads.
We watched a little TV, washed up, and went to sleep.