A Book Festival to a Bare Root Apple Tree
This past weekend, we had the opportunity to travel to the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, where I attended the Ridges to Rivers Book Festival in Viroqua, Wisconsin.
We enjoy taking car trips, and fortunately, most of our route was two-lane roads which took us over and along winding rivers and lush green grass. The trees are not leafed out yet, but that did not matter much. During our drive, the landscape changed the closer we were to the Driftless area.
If you are wondering about the definition of driftless, I found the simplest definition on Driftless Wisconsin.com: “A lack of drift indicates that an area was skirted by the most recent passage of glaciers. This dodging of the glacial bullet often leaves a landscape that looks radically different from the areas surrounding it—and that describes Driftless Wisconsin to a “t.” If you want to read more, I left the links below.
The Kickapoo River meanders through dairy farms, Amish homesteads, and apple orchards thriving on hilltops. Quaint small towns have distinct personalities with shops, parks, and small businesses. The Elroy and Sparta bike trail has been a favorite family vacation spot.
In Viroqua, we discovered Driftless Books, a bookstore in a historic tobacco warehouse building. We were surprised that tobacco farming was introduced in Wisconsin in the 1830s.
Then we drove to Readstown for dinner at Kickapoo Creekside. We had an excellent meal. My view out the window was of cows, hills, and green grass. Michael could not help but keep his eye on the NFL draft happening in Green Bay. (haha)
The book festival was held at the Western Technical College, and a special thank you to Deb Clark and all the volunteers for a well-organized event. They supplied tables and chairs, which helped not having to bring our own. The festival was a vibrant gathering of authors, book enthusiasts, and residents coming together to celebrate literature. I was a part of the scheduled list of authors who read a ten-minute excerpt of their books and five minutes of Q&A in the Mcintosh Memorial Library. We enjoyed our free ice-cream sandwiches!
Serendipity found us when he realized the Driftless area is also home to apple orchards. Since we have been trying to find an Idared apple for almost twenty years, we called the 1913 Kickapoo Orchard in Gays Mills, which is over a century old and carries heritage apples! Harrison gave us a how-to “spiel,” as he said, to plant a bare-root apple tree. We soaked the roots in a bucket of water for four hours and followed his directions for planting our tree outside my studio window.
As I have written before, there is always beauty in the unexpected. Our trip began as a book festival, and now we are the proud parents of a heritage Idared apple tree!
Have you had a serendipitous event in your life? Please share your comments below.
