Rainy Day at Parfrey's Glen (October 2023)

Thursday was the last day of my vacation/staycation. And like all foggy-misty-rainy weekdays, it was a perfect day to visit Parfrey's Glen. I got there just before 10:00 after making a brief stop at nearby Owen County Park.

I'd stopped there because I drive by the sign for it all the time but have never visited. I figured I was in no hurry so I actually turned onto Owen Park Road to check it out. It was a lovely detour. The fall colors on Owen Park Road were spectacular and the breezes had leaves raining down everywhere. Then, as I climbed further up its hill, I entered a thick fog, and in that fog was Owen Park. My friend Ben says that it has an amazing view on a clear day. I kinda loved the view on this foggy day.

The man who lives across the street was walking his small dog around the park. He commented on the weather and I said "it's all good, I love it." The dog was off leash and looked old and wise. Eventually, man and dog returned home (the dog dawdlingly) and I spent a few minutes having a nice sit. Then I got back into my car and headed back down Owen Park Road, and the views going downhill were even more magical, especially when the road met WI 78 and I got a look of the landscape across the highway down Petra Road. I could've sat at that intersection for a good while, but I think the driver behind me was already annoyed by my deliberate driving. Sorry dude.

When I arrived at Parfrey's Glen, there were only two cars in the lot. The air was misty enough that it was triggering my windshield wipers every ten seconds or so, but not so misty that it felt like rain. As I headed into the Glen, it did rain for a minute or two every now and then, but it was mostly just warm and humid. I was wearing a hoodie and it felt like too much. On my way in, I passed one older couple heading back to the parking lot.

Later on, I met a father and son on the trail. The son was maybe seven or eight and carrying an umbrella and he was talking about watching out for slippery stones. The trails were buried under inches of great big yellow maple leaves soaked from a couple days of rain. Later on when they were on their way out of the gorge, and I was on my way in, the boy (no longer carrying the umbrella) misstepped and took a wild spill into the creek, totally soaking one side of his pants. He clumsily righted himself and he seemed to be laughing it off. His dad looked at me ruefully and said, "probably doing laundry today".

I walked out to the waterfall which was a bit fogged over and seemed smaller than usual. The trees everywhere were yellow and orange and brown, and the creek was gathering leaves. We were on the warm side of an approaching cold front. The wind was persistent and gusty, and each new gust released a torrent of yellow leaves into the air above the creek like oversized confetti.

Like the man's old dog, I dawdled my way back to my car. But once there, I decided to continue my walk along the Ice Age Trail segment at Roznos Meadow, just a short drive west from Parfrey's Glen on County DL. I always underestimate Roznos Meadow. But it's always a great hike, and longer than I expect it to be, offering up spectacular views of the Talus Slopes and the Bluffs around Devil's Lake. The hills were brilliant with color, but so were the prairies, their oranges and browns deepened and saturated by the air. Pillars of fog were rising out of the hills, and the air smelled like cinnamon and nutmeg.

Roznos Meadow is a large flat expanse between bluffs - it's the bed of an ancient river that dried up at the end of the last Ice Age when a moraine formed and dammed the water that flowed through it, thereby creating Devil's Lake. On a day like this one, it's not hard to imagine that river. I walked the length of the trail to where it met South Lake Road at the base of the East Bluff. By then, it had started raining. A persistent rain. Before I'd even started heading back to my car, I was soaked. The steady rain turned became a legit downpour. I wasn't necessarily in a hurry, but I was walking a bit more purposefully, if only because my saturated hoodie was starting to feel like a thunderblanket. It was giving me a workout.

I started on my way home around 3:00 and by the time I got to the Merrimac Ferry, it had mostly stopped raining. When I got home, the clouds were thinning and there was even some sun. But I enjoyed the alone time, and there's something nice about getting rained on.

Rainy Day at Parfrey's Glen (October 2023)