Our bed was wonderful, although we did wake up screaming a few times with the same nightmare ...... Denny's baby photo!
The bed we slept in had a home-made quilt with photographs of Denny's family and all the grand children sewn onto it. Having studied the quilt before we went to sleep, I think we were just asking for trouble.
After recovering from our nightmares, we had breakfast and set off for Denny and Mak's home in Wisconsin, a four hour drive.
The drive was quick and soon we were driving through Steven's Point, the home of "cheeseheads". To explain - because cheese is a famous Wisconsin product, and Wisconsin supports the Green Bay Packers, all Packer's fans are called cheeseheads. In fact they love the name and even go to football games wearing hats in the shape of cheese wedges, something to see!
We made our sandwiches for the forthcoming train journey and then sat around the fireplace chatting, while enjoying the sound and warmth of the log fire - jealous? You should be, it was brilliant, but the best was still to come!
We had a wonderful supper of a green salad in the best home made salad dressing I have ever had, poppy seed dressing. I must add that while I think it is the best, Jules thought it tasted too much like chutney ..... that's why she reasoned I like it so much and she doesn't.
However we both agreed that Mak's tenderloin was absolutely perfect! I did spare a thought for Dad and his quest for the perfect steak - it's over Pops, we found it and ate it!
After dinner we settled down to the next phase of our brain washing and watched the Packers play the Dallas Cowboys. This was no mean feat as 75% of the country could not watch the game, however, Denny and Mak did have the required TV channel. In fact Wisconsin's Governor could not watch the game and Jules suggested we invite him over for the game!
With both teams having 10-1 records it was a snorter of a game, and the Packers only lost after a dubious referee call, that even I could see was bollocks! Oh well, all over the world it seems that referees suffer from eye sight problems, of course that's excluding Julie's Dad!
We all trundled off to bed after some great bread pudding (from Debbie) and equally great cremebrulee (from Mak), although Jules did argue long into the night that the cremebrulee was tops!.
We then decided to give the hot tub a whirl. Jules and I spent 30 minutes having hot water jets spraying water over our bodies ...... what a hard life we lead! We decided we had better get out after 30 minutes in case we break the hot tub, so we scampered upstairs and dived into bed to stay warm.
We were greeted in the morning with a white world. A light snowfall had left everything looking like it was sprinkled with casting sugar.
We went outside to help Mak fill up the 2315 bird feeders she has in her garden and felt the -12 degree weather for the first time. It was so cold your words froze on the way out of your mouth!
After being tortured for a while, we packed the car and our tour guides began our tour of Steven's Point.
We had another great morning with the highlight being Archies! Archies is a locally run pub (by Archie) and his wife Sue. Denny and Mak meet their friends there every Friday Morning for lunch.
They were all great characters and "sassy" Americans. We heard the "how do you sell a duck to a deaf man?" joke and I had an excellent chicken sandwich, while Jules had a brilliant beef burger.
But, the best part was Archie himself. Archie has a country and western band, he collects electric guitars and in his spare time, he takes photographs of country music legends (and also runs his pub).
They were all there, Cash, Nelson, Haggard, Campbell and in his rock section, Orbison and Perkins. However the crème de la crème (as far as I was concerned) was a signed photograph of the King, Waylon Jennings! Oh my, it was brilliant and again I thought of Dad, "he would love to be in this pub" I told Archie.
Archie told me that he had received an exact replica of Waylon's leather bound Fender telecaster as a gift - a replica of the original one that we saw in Nashville's Country Music Hall of Fame, oh man, imagine that!
I took a lot of photos and all too soon we had to say goodbye to Archie's and hit the road. We felt so much at home and part of the family that we did not look forward to saying goodbye.
We reached Portage, our train station to board the Empire Builder train, and dropped into a pub called the "Firehouse". They were having a "liquor licence" party (having just received their liquor licence) so we enjoyed their meatballs and various other snacks, while Jules and Mak had a final beer shandy together.
And then, as with all good things, it came to an end. The train pulled up and we were hugging each other goodbye, and they were real hugs, the kind you reserve for your family.
We had a brilliant two days and cannot wait to have the opportunity to reciprocate the wonderful hospitality of Denny and Mak when Mak comes to South Africa in March next year ....... we'll have the Amarula waiting!
So we boarded the train, waved sadly goodbye and set off on our two and a half day journey to Seattle.
We have been traveling now for 36 hours and I wish I could hear Denny's Chicago accent telling us some local story, instead of the boring sound of the rail lines!
Starbucks ........ here we come!
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