Yum! Yum!

I imagine real life moose droppings are like deer droppings, only larger.  Somewhere between golf ball diameter and in this beast’s case near bike wheel diameter.  Today’s post is brought to you from sometime in 1982 and somewhere in Wisconsin.  In fact after checking the old Great Adventure Diary, this picture is from August fourth, near Tomahawk, WI.  Yup, that’s me, seemingly enjoying mana from heaven.

Again from the log, we left the Eau Claire Dells that morning.  We stopped to take pictures and pick raspberries, before leaving the dells.  We apparently passed through the metropolis of Glandon, with hardly noticing it.  The surrounding countryside made for good riding.  We continued down the road to Merrill.  It was getting hot by then. 

Apparently we got the slows about then because our normal lunch stop was extended into a “nice, long, multi-stop lunch”.  Merrill must have been the county seat, because we ate in front of the courthouse.  Anne comments on its nice mosaic floors, woodwork and dome. 

Also apparently, our mid-day sloth (read as Anne’s) was replaced my afternoon sloth.  According to the log, against my objections, we press on, regardless.  “The ride from there is gorgeous!   There were a couple of long hills, where the road left the river, but otherwise easy, and now we’re in the north woods!”   I was eventually mollified with a motel for the night in Tomahawk.  Also, probably the moose droppings helped.  The room only cost us a total of $18.90.  However, it did not have TV (neither broadcast nor cable) and not even the Internet.  Back then the north woods implied  a lack of modern amenities, read flush toilets.  Motels were still civilized.

After all folks, this was the dark ages.  Our bicycles still had analog down-tube shifters.  You actually had to take a hand off the handlebars in order to shift.  A tricky maneuver when you were traveling downhill at speed.  Now a days we have integrated STI or Rapid-Fire shifting, that never requires you to lose your grip.  And you all know about Wi-Fi, Twitter and the rest of that lot, after all, you’re reading this.

Today’s header shows just a small segment of a much larger mosaic.  This tiled mural is on the outside of the Saint Louis flood wall, at the southern end of the Riverfront trail.  I don’t know if it is a testament to its beauty as an art work or simply a testament to its durability, but so far (knock on wood) it has avoided vandalisn.

UPDATE: Thanks to Mr. Bill aka the Grumpy Growler, I give you the following picture of real moose droppings, instead of me posing as a figurative one: