A Brief Visit to Madison, Wisconsin

Madison, WI, is a nice place to visit during early September. We went there to see some relatives as the primary purpose, and this blog post is to recount what we did during this sojourn.

Friday, 3 September 2010

1. General sightseeing in the town of Madison.


2. Taking in a concert by the group Nay Palm Bones at the School of Music in the University.

Saturday, 4 September 2010

1. We learnt that a University of Wisconsin scientist named Babcock developed a reliable method of testing the fat content of milk in the 1890s. To honor this newly found knowledge, we ate ice cream at the Babcock Hall Dairy Store.


2. From the dairy store, a leisurely stroll took us to the Memorial Union. A fellow passenger on my flight to Wisconsin had relived his memory of sipping beer on the Union's deck along the shores of Lake Mendota. We didn't bother with any beer, though: it is not my cup of tea and neither was it of any of my nieces' and daughter's who accompanied me that day.

We finished the day celebrating Krishna Janmashtami, Lord Krishna's birthday, at our aunt's house. After several an hour or so of prayer, a sumptuous dinner followed. A picture of the goodies that our aunt prepared, as part of the celebration, is shown alongside.

Sunday, 5 September 2010

1. First stop, The Shoe box. The store is set up in a small town named Black Earth. It boasts more than 300,000 pairs of shoes of various brands. I imagined a larger store than it was; in fact, I had imagined something as large as a Costco warehouse in the Silicon Valley, but it seemed smaller. As expected, several pairs of shoes were bought.


2. Second stop, Grumpy Troll Pizza. This stop was necessary because we were all hungry; one of my nieces in the group had a nice memory of a former visit to this restaurant, and this settled our choice for an eating place.



3. Third stop, Cave of the Mounds. An interesting fact of this cave is that it was not even discovered until the 1930s! It reminded me of how even uniform containerization was not part of the transportation industry until very recently.


4. Fourth stop, Little Norway. By the time we got here, it was a bit too late. Tours were closed, but the store was not. So, we bought chocolates, biscuits and lefse. This particular version of lefse we bought, based on the cashier's description, sounded like a very close cousin of आलू पराठा.

We converged for dinner to our niece's house where the stuffed zucchini she made was the keynote of the dinner.

Monday, 6 September 2010

The morning started with a visit to the bus depot to drop one of our nieces off.

1. Another visit to the Babcock Hall, but without any ice cream this time: the store was closed, thanks to Labor Day.


2. Nice home-made lunch in front of Lake Mendota. The company and the surroundings always make whatever you eat feel a little tastier.

The evening was a trip to the airport to drop my daughter off.

It is always nice to visit new places. If you have been provided access, you can see the picture gallery.