Day 50, 20.5 miles

We’re not far from town and I’m excited about the prospect of a town breakfast. Our favorite meal. We had enough cell service to Google breakfast restaurants near me and there is one very close to the trail. Woohoo!

But first we walk some more lovely trail to the devils staircase at the edge of Janesville. There are actually multiple staircases near the river. We walk along the river for quite a while and it’s really pretty. The green grasses and willows along it are so vibrant! Truly beautiful.

We pick up a bike path that leads us towards the Jeff’s kitchen, our breakfast awaits. Only a quarter mile out of the way, so worth it!

We retrace our steps to continue on and now head over to the post office. It’s just on the other side of the river in a small mall. Greenleaf found some more items to send home and I send home my one person tent and an MP3 player. Together we send home 6lbs. Good riddance for now!

To get back on track we cross a pedestrian bridge with a cool leaf design. And a wooden lounge chair. I try to emulate Marilyn Monroe by posing on the lounge chair while Greenleaf takes the spotlight under the green leaves.

On the other side we run into a guy who we just met while he was in his car across the bridge. He’s eager to show us photos of the Ice age trail on his phone but we don’t really want to stop. Sorry, we finally started moving again.

Much more bike path follows. Some of it in shade but most of it in the full sun. Yikes this is unpleasant.

Then I hear someone call my name. It’s Tina, the lady we met yesterday. She is biking with a bunch of friends. It’s fun to see her again but the friends want to keep moving so we snap a few photos and she rides off.

An urban hot hike like this demands an ice cream break so I Google ice cream near me. There is a creamery in 4 miles! Perfect!

There is quite a bit of bike traffic and some comment on our sun umbrellas. Yes they are great! It’s still hot but my brain is not frying.

The icecream is more sugar than we need but it’s good to sit inside in the airconditioning.

On to the town of Milton we go! Two teenage boys are running a lemonade stand but it’s a bit rowdy between the two of them. We buy three cups as one of them dumps water on the other. As we leave we hear one yell “I quit!!”. This business may not be long lived.

We get some supplies at the Dollar General and then some deli items at the Piggly Wiggly. We think we see a backpacker hike through the park as we round the corner but we’re just too far away to say hi. With our grocery delay we don’t see him again.

Filled up with pasta salad, potato salad and grapes we head over to the historic Milton house and cross underneath the highway to Storr Lake. We pick up the trail again and find a spot to sleep. It’s noisy with a nearby generator of sorts but we eventually drift off to sleep.