Late June 2021
An entry or two ago I explained that the historic Wonder Bar here in Madison had closed and that the building was looking at an ignominious fate at the hands of a wrecking ball. So one Saturday earlier this month I set out on my bicycle to get a few photos of it before it was gone forever.
On my way
south, I stopped at a beach on the shore of Lake Monona to take a look out onto
the water. The sidewalk is up on a small hill that looks down upon the beach so
you get a really nice view of the lake. This park has a few bespoke benches which I believe were made by a friend's sister who specializes in metal art.
Not being in
a hurry, I took the long way through the park which took me across Wingra Creek
and along the lakeshore for a stretch. At one point I found myself at the
entrance to Turville Point Conservation Park. Turville Point is a small
peninsula that juts out into Lake Monona to form Turville Bay.
I could not
recall ever having moseyed around Turville Point so I locked my bike onto the
empty bike rack at the park's entrance and started walking.
I disturbed
a lot of birds as I strode down the path including this one. I am not sure what
it is because, even though we own two copies of Birds of Wisconsin, I
cannot find either of them. The only bird I know of with a green head like that is the grackle but that doesn't look like one.**
Madison
parks are being overrun with invasive plants – mainly garlic mustard, methinks
– and so, in addition to encouraging people to pick it, the city has been
renting trips (yes, I looked it up) of goats and leaving them at parks to eat
up all the unwanted plants. That day it was Turville Park's turn.
My stroll
around Turville Park was an unexpected but quite pleasurable detour. The Wonder
Bar was only a couple of blocks away so it didn't take me long to pedal over
there and take some photographs. I really hope that a space and the money is
found to move the building.
I biked down
the street a bit more and came to a house that is the only one I know of in
town that has a belfry.
I slowly made my way downtown and came across another duck with her ducklings. This time she wasn't a mallard and because of the above problem locating a certain reference book, I am unsure what type of duck we're looking at here. Regardless, those youngins are mighty cute.
Like a fool
I decided to head to the far east side to check out a couple of things that I'd
been planning to see once biking season came around.
The first
was of the few remaining farms left in the city limits.
Just up the
road was The Founder Shrine built in 1952. Now, it may have been less than a
mile as the crow flies but it was all uphill and I thought I was going to go
into cardiac arrest biking up that hill at about 1 M.P.H. I am surprised that I wasn't passed by any turtles. Anyway, it is a Schoenstatt
Shrine, the first built in the U.S. I gather that they are all replicas of the
original in Schoenstatt, Germany. According to Wikipedia, the Schoenstatt
Apostolic Movement is a movement within the Roman Catholic Church that started
there in 1914.
The area
around the shrine was all trees and corn fields until fairly recently. Luckily
the shrine is set back rather far from the road so it is still in a peaceful
setting.
I'd never
known about it until this past winter when I put in on my list of places to
bike to come good weather.
2 comments:
After visually describing Olin Park, I was surprised you did not mention that this is where the Madison Homebrewers put on the annual Great Taste of the Midwest beer festival, which other visitors to this weblog may have attended.
It never occurred to me to mention it although I did think about as I biked by the area where it is held.
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