Road Cheese Hypertour. Roadside America

7 days in Wisconsin-Minnesota-Iowa-Illinois

We have to buy a Cheese Hat.

It's a legit souvenir, not just a badge of Wisconsin sports fanaticism. The bright yellow sponge wedges are sold at tourist attractions, like coonskin caps in Frontier Villages and Indian headdresses at Trading Posts. And since we're off to visit the cheesiest sights in the land of milk and mosquitos, well, that hat will come in handy.

The Road Cheese™ hypertour is one we've been thinking about for a while: a sweep up from Chicago via Wisconsin and Minnesota to the Canadian border, investigating museums, attractions and statues missed on our east-west journeys. And there are a few attractions we owe a revisit to chronicle reported "changes": the SPAM Museum, Tommy Bartlett's Robot World, Max Nordeen's Wheels Museum.

We opt to visit four states, leaving plenty of lake country targets for future trips.

Trojan Horse. It's a satisfying hypertour harvest -- over 100 attractions visited (or attempted). Since driving Road Cheese, we've published a number of individual sight reports. Now you can retrace the entire trip...

Start Road Cheese Tour

Day 1: Clown Hammers for Angels
Day 2: Suck of the Dells
Day 3: More Bovine Pleasures in Wisconsin
Day 4: In the Land of Rocky Taconite
Day 5: Statue Day
Day 6: Clocks, Caves and Canned Meat
Day 7: HyperLincolns

Trip Highlights

Day 1: Chicago-Wisconsin Dells

Cars on a Spike, Harmilda the Beloved Cow, World's Largest Collection of Angels, Bessie the Big Cow, Funeral Parlor with dead animal dioramas, Circus World Museum

Day 2: Dells, vicinity

House on the Rock, Forevertron, Lareau's World of Miniature, The Dells, Robot World, Mir Space Station, Mass Panic

Day 3: Dells to Duluth, MN

FAST fiberglass statues, Rock In The House, Prairie Moon Sculpture Garden, Thunderbird Museum, Talking Cow, Replica Cheese, Woodcarving Museum

Day 4: Wandering to Intl. Falls, MN

Sandpaper Room, Rocky Taconite, Cabin of the Root Beer Lady, World's largest Floating Loon, Mineview in the Sky, World's Largest Hockey Stick, Iron Man Statue, Ironworld USA, Pellet Pete, Greyhound Bus Origin Center

Day 5: Canuck border south to Minneapolis

Giant Thermometer, Smokey Bear statue, Willy the Worm, Blackduck duck statues, Bemidji Paul & Babe, Fireplace of States, Bunyan-obilia, Paul Bunyan and Cradle, Tiger Muskie, St. Urho statue, Big Tom turkey, Pelican, Viking sights of Alexandria, World's Largest Crow, Darwin Twine Ball, Mall of America

Day 6: Minneapolis to southeast Iowa

Heritage Halls Museum,Cabela's Outfitters, indoor slaughter dioramas, SPAM Museum, Ed's Museum, House of Clocks, Pinky the Elephant, Spook Cave, Field of Dreams