The Baseball Trip 2026

Day 1 - Monday, August 3

There are only two rules on the Baseball Trip: no interstate highways and no chain restaurants. 

We - and by we I mean myself and Randy, navigator extraordinaire - like to count things along the way. Usually we count things like women on riding mowers, personal injury lawyer billboards, Kingdom Halls, Confederate flags, and other signs of the apocalypse. This trip we are counting one lane roads due to construction and extreme wildfire danger warning signs.

Well, let's get the boring part out of the way early: today is merely a travel day, but if anything of interest comes up, I will let you know. This is the corn and soybeans tour as we head west on US 20 through Rockford, Illinois and into Galena. Then, north into Wisconsin on Wisconsin route 80.

After that, we veered off onto Wisc 35, the Scenic River Byway.

Random Observation From Randy: They have nothing better to do than to flatten a scenic byway to make it four lanes.

Nonetheless, there are only a few good spots to take pictures of the river because its hidden by trees and freight trains. Here's one:

I should have more tomorrow since the river is directly behind our motel.

By the way,we are in La Crosse, Wisconsin for the night. You know, home of...

Favorite Town Name: Dickeyville, WI.

Favorite Signs: Old Highway Road

                          Schnuks Grocery.

Things we cannot hang around for:  Car and Tractor Show, Potosi, WI.

One Lane Roads:  2

Wildfire warnings: 0

Next: Saint Paul, Minnesota for the Saint Paul Saints (Twins AAA affiliate).