summer bucket list

Every summer, Madison undergoes a dramatic transformation: most students leave town to spend the summers elsewhere. Grown-ups across the area reclaim the city and every glorious event and activity it has to offer. In an effort to capitalize...

get it?

... on the coolest of the cool stuff available to us, I made a summer bucket list and broke it down into three convenient categories: eat, drink, and be merry.

eat

1. The Dane County Farmers Market professes to be the largest in the country. Amen, Sconnies. Most summer Saturdays you'll find me strolling the sidewalks and interacting with vendors and fellow food shoppers (including buyers for Madison's best restaurants).

2. I love grilling food, especially lemons along with with any type of fish...

this was grilled trout and lemons

... so this summer's Bucket List includes many opportunities to indulge that hobby.

drink

3. The Grumpy Troll, a locally famous brew-pub located in Mt Horeb, WI, has a reputation for excellent beers, food, and service. Best of all, it's conveniently located among some of the country's best road-biking trails and country roads. More on road biking later.

4. New Glarus is just 15 minutes away, is the home to a well-known brewery, and last weekend the quaint little town hosted a BBC (Beer, Bacon, and Cheese) Festival. My friend Johnny's bacon-making start-up, Ppork, secured a booth so a couple girlfriends and I stopped by to show our support and taste some awesome food. Crossed one off the summer bucket list already!**

mmmbacon

5. University of Wisconsin famously has one of the best outdoor drinking establishments known to humankind: Memorial Union Terrace. Let's go listen to some rad live music and watch the sun set behind sail boats.

Oh, and they allow Monkeys! 

6. Wollersheim Winery offers tours and tastings at very reasonable prices. (We're talking $2 to $5!!!) John expressed interest in this, too, so I'll likely drag my boyfriend along for this one. It's nestled in some of the prettiest Wisconsin countryside, making even the drive out there a real pleasure.

be merry

7. After eating and drinking all these calories, I'd like to burn some of them off by biking some local trails I have yet to explore. First and second among them: Military Ridge State Trail and Badger State Trail. From either trail I can bike a nice loop away from and back to my house, eliminating the need to rack my bike. Because I don't have a rack.

8. A couple of my girlfriends and I have been know to cause quite a stir at the Epic Bombers games. If these are still on weekdays, I may have to instead settle for causing a similar scene at a Mallards game. Lucky for me, both crews play at Warner Park. That's called convenience, kids.

9. In Googling "cool stuff to do in Madison" I was not surprised to find canoeing and kayaking, and pleasantly surprised to find stand-up paddling. Wheee! I have relatively terrible balance, so let's also call this one "Swimming in a Madison Area Lake."

these might not be a bad idea

10. Located just 25 minutes away, Cave of the Mounds is known throughout the upper Midwest as the only place you can go where it's 50 degrees in summer. That sounds refreshing, and right up my geology-minded alley.

Can	Cambrian
Old	Ordovician	**Cave of	the Mounds**
Senators	Silurian
Demand	Devonian
More	Mississippian
Political	Pennsylvanian
Power	Permian
Than	Triassic
Junior	Jurassic
Congressmen?	Cretaceous
Tough	Tertiary	Pigeon Egg Omelets Make People Puke	Paleocene Eocene Oligocene Miocene Pliocene Pleistocene
Question	Quaternary	Heavily	Holocene

I did this from memory

11. Frank Lloyd Wright named his Spring Green, Wisconsin, home Taliesin, which is Welsh for shining brow, in reference to the building's location perched near but not atop a hill in the lovely countryside. He used the property and its accompanying fellowship as both classroom and laboratory, testing out themes and designs which would later resurface in public buildings and private residences. I could go on, and on, and on...

clockwise from top: Taliesin, some road, a pond, and those fields

... but suffice it to say that I'm a HUGE fan of Frank Lloyd Wright, because of in spite of his undeniable egomania. Though I visit the property every summer, and have toured the interior once, I'd like to go back and see it again.

12. Vilas Zoo probably has monkeys. I wouldn't know, because I've never been there. But I love monkeys. Especially the ones that are dogs named Monkey. So, the zoo makes the cut.

The problem with lists, especially those created over time, is that I always figure I'm missing something, so here's my catch-all.

13. Everything else. Like sitting on the Continental's outdoor patio with my girlfriends, enjoying the happy hour specials and great company. Sleeping with the ceiling fan whirling and the windows open during a wild summer thunderstorm...

that'll do

... while hopefully avoiding the direct path of any tornadoes, taking the dog for long walks along our neighborhood's tranquil wooded trails and across the scenic bluffs of Devils Lake, join friends to on the grassy yard of the state Capitol building during Concerts on the Square, watch Rhythm & Booms from the shores of Lake Mendota....

**This is neither the first nor the last time I put something on a list just for the satisfaction of crossing it off.