There are some expenditures that suffer me no guilt: annual passes to state parks and hooded sweatshirts from said state parks are on the list. This summer and fall we will be able to visit all the state parks in Michigan and Wisconsin as many times as we’d like.
Governor Dodge is on a very short of the best state parks in the Midwest. And due to its location in Iowa County, WIsconsin (the southwest corner of the state), it is a relatively hidden gem.
We drove through the verdant country and pulled off into Governor Dodge. My girlfriend wanted to get a sense of what the park had to offer, so we drove from Cox Hollow Lake to Twin Lake. We also got a beefy hotdog and an ice cream cone at the concessions.
The ice cream that day in June was cream cheese with blueberry and pie crust. That says a lot right there: this is a very good state park. Instead of the more popular waterfall trail, we opted for the Pine Cliff Trail, because we wanted to hike off the treats.
What I learned was that during the last few glaciations, a species of pine native to northern WIsconsin was pushed by the ice packs down to the area. It found sanctuary in the acidic limestone cliffs, where it continues to live on, stranded on an island far from the rest its kind.
The other thing I learned is that Wisconsin state parks serve really good ice cream.
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