Green Lake bike trails.
Green Lake’s bike trails add to the area’s getaway appeal
Lauree Renaud just wanted to be able to bike in her backyard. ♦ Renaud, who lives in Green Lake, pulled out a trail map of Wisconsin and noticed a big void in her part of the state. There was the Mascoutin Valley State Trail, but it was grassy and mostly used for snowmobiling in the winter. ♦ I, too, noticed the lack of trails and state properties in that area of the state when I began planning my trip there. Green Lake is the primary draw, of course, attracting boaters, fishermen and summer vacationers. There’s Horicon Marsh and the Wild Goose Trail to the south, the Wiouwash Trail jutting out of Oshkosh to the north and the lonely Mascoutin Trail in the middle. ♦ “I realized one day that I was taking my bike and having to haul it to other counties to go for a bike ride on a trail, and I thought, this is kind of ridiculous,” Renaud said. “Not that I don’t love going to other trails, but it would be nice just to have one outside of your door.” ♦ So she decided to help build one.
Serendipitously, Green Lake was working with the Wisconsin Bike Federation to develop a master plan for the area at the time.
“I thought, wow, this is providence,” she said. But she feared the plan would end there — in a spiral-bound packet on a shelf in a government office.
So she formed Green Lake Greenways in 2008. Within the year, the group had secured a $550,000 grant from the Department of Transportation to build a 2-mile paved trail along Highway 23 in Green Lake. Soon they would begin fixing up the Mascoutin Trail, working with the three counties it passes through to level it, add gravel and mow the grass. Benches and picnic tables were added at rest stops along with an informational sign at a wetland along the trail.
“We saw that there was such a need for great trails in our area,” Renaud said. “Whether you come from an urban area, or you come from locally, you can come out to the trail and it’s a linear park. You can relax, you can enjoy, and it is closeup with nature.”
I met Renaud and her husband, Paul, along with another Green Lake Greenways board member, Mike Rhoades, at the trailhead on Locust Road off County Highway E north of Ripon.
We leisurely pedaled about 5 miles north to a wetland area where an egret stood elegantly in the water. Sandhill cranes called from the distance, a bale of turtles congregated near half-submerged logs and a bald eagle kept watch from a perch high in a tree. Rhoades told me a relatively rare bird, an ibis, was spotted there once and drew dozens of birders to the trail to look for it again.
The crushed-gravel path follows the Old Milwaukee Railroad bed for 12 miles north to Berlin. This western segment of the trail travels through three counties: Fond du Lac, Winnebago and Green Lake. A separate 10-mile segment travels from Rosendale to Fond du Lac.
Since Renaud was new to advocacy work when she started Green Lake Greenways, she said she received help from area groups like Fox Cities Greenways. That group was instrumental in creating the Fox Cities Paper Trail, a collection of off-road paths, bike lanes and streets that loops through 11 Fox Cities communities.
Renaud hopes to create something similar linking communities in Green Lake County, beginning with extending the paved trail to Ripon.
South of the wetlands, the Mascoutin Trail passes Vines & Rushes Winery, owned by Ryan and Megan Prellwitz. Ryan Prellwitz, who grew up on the strawberry farm that is now home to the winery, would ride the old Mascoutin Trail to school occasionally.
The couple started the winery in 2012 and business has been booming since. With a convenient location right off the trail, the winery regularly sees hundreds of visitors on weekends. Live music and other events including farm-to-table wine-pairing dinners are common.
Proceeds from the winery’s Mascoutin, a dry red made with three grapes for the three counties the trail travels through, go toward the trail. Other nods to the trail come in the large mural of the 5900 locomotive that traveled the old railway from Milwaukee to Ripon and Berlin. The winery’s wine club is called the 5900 Club.
The winery also serves beer from Ripon’s craft brewery, Knuth Brewing Co. The two-year-old brewery was the first to open in Ripon in nearly 80 years. Beers there are complemented by woodfired pizza, sandwiches, salads and more.
Cruising the lake
While the bike trails and routes in Green Lake are a growing asset, the lake is what draws most people to the area. Measuring 7 miles long, 2 miles wide and 236 feet deep, it’s the deepest natural inland lake in Wisconsin.
Driving north from Milwaukee, it’s mostly farmland before you reach it — a blue-green oasis in a sea of green-yellow cornstalks.
A scenic cruise aboard the Escapade, operated out of the Heidel House Resort, offers a broad history of the lake.
On the 9 a.m. cruise I took, our captain explained that the lake is home to many summer-only residents and is often compared to Lake Geneva. There are similarities — posh lakeside homes, golf courses and resorts — but the city itself is smaller and less touristy than Lake Geneva.
Before European settlement, 13 American Indian tribes called the area home, including the Winnebago. A 1930s archaeological study of the area found 100 effigy mounds — at least two still remain on Sandstone Point on the lake’s south shore.
White settlers arrived in the 1830s, and the first resort, Oakwood Lodge, was built in 1867. It’s believed to be the first summer resort west of Niagara Falls.
Victor Lawson, the publisher of the Chicago Daily News, and his wife Jessie, were among prominent early summer vacationers. The Lawsons spent millions building a large home and developing 1,100 acres on the lake. That included constructing a golf course and lodge that the Stone Development company would add to and today is part of the Green Lake Conference Center, a Christian retreat center.
The Escapade took us past the sprawling center and its handful of historic buildings, including a large water tower built in 1908 that our captain said is open to the public to climb to the top.
After looping around the south shore, we motored back to the landing at the Heidel House, where employees were readying the small beach and visitors were already donning life jackets for the
Jet Skis, stand-up paddle boards and kayaks.
Kids pedaled bikes down the pathway behind the resort. A short road route could connect them with the city’s 2-mile paved trail along Highway 23 for a safe, easy ride through the country.
The lake is the star here, yes, but biking is on its trail.