My daughter and I were headed to a graduation party of a dear friend's son in Madison. After trying to find a park and ride to leave her car along the interstate without any luck, I just decided to travel the extra hour and pick her up for our overnight trip. And I realized we could take Hwy 14! A road I hadn’t taken since graduating from college in 1992!
I loved my ride from LaCrosse to Middleton, back to my hometown when I was in college. It was probably the beginning of me always taking the scenic route. And boy did it not disappoint 34 years later! The highway between LaCrosse and Richland Center, (which is about half way), is absolutely stunning terrain! The memories of all my trips in my cars that barely ran and I’m lucky to have made it home back then all came back to me!
On the way back the next day, we had to stop at Coon Valley. Coon Creek is a small creek but I found it to be a swift little creek that runs right through Coon Valley. It brought back memories of the Coon Creek Canoe Race in spring of 1991. The UW-L Recreation Dept put on a fundraiser that was a canoe race down Coon Creek for about 2-3 miles. A fun event! I was the Advertising Director at the student Newspaper, The Racquet. Fellow student, Duane Nelson was the Business Mgr and he mentioned we had been invited to run in the Celebrity Race of Coon Creek. It was held on that Saturday morning of the event and Brucie Bumchuckles from the local radio station was the 7 years reigning champion of the race! Duane asked me if I knew how to paddle a canoe! Um yes, I grew up on canoes! We were in!
We showed up early that Saturday morning for the race! We got our canoe and paddle, got set and started floating down the creek! Duane and I had talked about beating Brucie and knew he was ahead of us a bit. As we paddled hard, I noticed the cows and my memory is of one peeing down the embankment and the large flood of urine went right into the creek. Eww.
But up ahead was Brucie! He happened to be stuck on a sandbar and was hopping out into the creek to get his canoe unstuck. Duane said “paddle hard!”. And just as we were passing Brucie, he grabbed our canoe to hold us back while he tried to free his canoe off the sandbar. Duane jumped out to give us a push and we were released from Brucie’s grip! Duane almost didn’t make it back into our canoe.
I can still hear Brucie behind us paddling as hard as he could to catch us! But we were almost to the finish line and when we crossed the media covering the event passed us and went to interview Brucie about his upset by the college kids. Well, our job was done I guess. We upset the champion and it was sweet but uneventful at the same time! We felt good as we looked at our accomplishments and high-fived each other! I still have the trophy paddle somewhere in a box!
Later that night the party beer tent at Coon Creek Canoe Races in Coon Valley emptied and everyone headed to downtown LaCrosse’s Third Street.
Bar time came around and the bars emptied to the street. It was packed! One side of the street started chanting “Taste’s Great” and the other side chanted, “Less filing!” A take back to the popular Miller Lite beer commercials. People filled the street and no cars could get through. Next thing you know some college kid was jumping on the back bumper of a parked cop car and soon enough the jumping was enough to flip the cop car on its side. Gas was leaking from the car and someone lit it all on fire with a lighter, not the greatest idea ever to do! The car was engulfed with fire.
My roommate and I stood across the street and I realized the police in riot gear were walking down the street from both sides. Wow, this is crazy. The police shot tear gas into the crowd, I grabbed my roommate's hand and told her to squint as we ran to get out of the way! I realized we didn’t need to be here now! We ended up walking home a few blocks and my roommate lost her contact lenses in the tear gas.
What a day, what a night! The college student who had lit the car on fire was arrested some time later in North Dakota. I remember calling home and telling my mom that I was there as Dan Rather on the NBC Nightly News reported on it on her tv!
No one remembers that there was a celebrity race at Coon Creek except maybe a few. Many people remember the little riot that evening. The UW-L Recreation Dept. no longer was able to have a beer tent and a few years later the Coon Creek Canoe Races ended.
The Coon Valley is a beautiful place in Southwest Wisconsin. It's called the driftless area as the glaciers had ended and left big rolling hills. It's a mix of farmland and small towns and a large Amish population. A great little road trip down memory lane!
