Departure: Des Moines, IA
Destination: Lake Geneva, Wisconsin
Left: July 30, 2014
Returned: July 31, 2014
Total Miles Traveled: 746.1
Author’s note: It’s important to be aware that I am a biker. I look and dress like a biker. A beard, lots of black and lots of leather.
This was, despite an unplanned overnight stay and a few hundred bucks in unplanned repairs, a pretty awesome trip. I was headed to Lake Geneva, WI to see the home of Gary Gygax, the creator of Dungeons & Dragons. A bonus was stopping off in Loves Park, IL to see Tod, a friend I’ve known for over half my life. Enjoy!
I opened the garage door of my Des Moines home at the crack of 5:30AM and let in the chilly 59 degree weather. If this was February this would have felt like a heatwave, but since it was July I wore my leather jacket underneath my vest. I briefly considered hauling my ass back upstairs and pulling my leather chaps out of the living room closet, but nixed the idea as I figured it would get warm soon enough.
I stopped at the Quick Trip at E 15th and Grand, gassed up my tank, and then went inside to see what they had for breakfast. The smell of the hot sandwiches turned my stomach. A subpar glazed donut washed down with some chocolate milk was the best they could do at this hour. I grabbed a Pepsi for my drink holder and went back to my bike. I plugged the charging cable into my phone. I like to listen to tabletop RPG podcasts while I ride, but wasn’t in the mood for earbuds so I used 3.5 MM male cable to plug my phone into my bike. This allows me to hear all the podcasts I’ve been saving up on my bike’s speakers as I roll down the highway. I thumbed the start button and my bike roared into life. I made sure the GPS was set for Loves Park, Illinois, dropped into first gear, rode a block north, turned right, and accelerated as I joined the morning commuters on the freeway.
Once up to freeway speed, it only took 12 seconds for me to regret not going back upstairs and grabbing my chaps out of the living room closet. I briefly considered going back (again) as once you get cold on a bike, you are going to be cold for a good long while, but I reasoned (again) it would warm up soon.
There wasn’t a whole lot of traffic on I-235, just folks going to work, and it remained the same as I took the exit for I-80 East a few miles later. I-80 is relatively flat in Iowa, but there are a few valleys and they were filled with morning fog, causing a few random spatters of moisture on my windshield. At cruising speed, the wind that did manage to come around my fairing was cool and thick as it pushed up into my nostrils.
To me, early mornings like this smell like the country. I grew up in a Lytton, Iowa, a tiny town of about 300 people. The entire place was surrounded by fields. We lived on the west edge of town. There were corn, or bean depending on the year, fields directly across the road from our house, about a 30 second walk behind our house, and about a 60 second walk to the West of our house. Or you could get on your bicycle and pedal East across the entire town (a total of 5 blocks), walk past the ball diamond, and be at the fields on that end of town.
Back in the days when I was a kid in Lytton, I didn’t know what Dungeons and Dragons was until I read the novelization of the E.T. movie. Even then I didn’t really understand what it was. Lytton was small. We didn’t have a convenience store until I was in 3rd grade. We didn’t even get 10 channel basic cable until I was in junior high.
During the D&D witch hunt, I vaguely recall being in the living room a few times after school and hearing it mentioned on some talk show my parents were watching. I don’t recall ever hearing D&D spoken of by anyone in Lytton. It wasn’t like there was anywhere you could buy it, so it just wasn’t a concern.
As the sun came up and burned off the low-lying fog, the sun was red, a shade of scarlet my brain wanted to associate with 4th edition cover of The Legend of the Five Rings. I only know this because the Happy Jacks RPG Podcast had been doing a live play recording using one of the editions.. It’s not really for me, but I had been curious and had been doing a bit of research on the system.
It did warm up soon enough, if you can call 90 minutes later soon enough. It happened right about the time I got near Iowa City. I did get lucky and it was only chilly enough to be slightly uncomfortable, not the bone-deep chill you can get on a bike if you’re not careful.
I made my first stop since leaving Des Moines shortly after 8AM at a Pilot truck stop in Walcott, IA. I added 4.5 gallons of gas, grabbed another Pepsi for the road, and then rode over to the McDonald’s across the lot from gas pumps. I wasn’t really hungry, but knew I would be in an hour or so and didn’t really want to stop until I got to Loves Park. Inside I was standing and reading the menu when an elderly couple came in with some younger children. The lady stood next to me. While I was reading the breakfast dollar menu, out of the corner of my eye I saw her turn her head and get a look at my vest and patches. Then she took a very large and very obvious step directly away from me. Even now, looking like a biker means you’re a criminal to some people. She didn’t look to see what my patches were. I don’t know if it would have made a difference to someone like that. They don’t see the words Bikers Against Child Abuse, they just see a patch and it means bad things to them.
I scarfed down a passable breakfast and got back on the rode. Back on I-80E I quickly rolled past Davenport, briefly wished I was stopping to see my friends in the area, and crossed the Mississippi River into Illinois. I took the exit for I-88 East just a few minutes later. The ride was uneventful for quite a while, sipping my Pepsi and cruising along at speeds that anyone in a car with lights on top would probably consider illegal. Illinois is pretty flat on this part of I-88 and I could see scenery for miles on either side at most of the time. Fields, houses, barns, industrial buildings and gas stations broke it up every now and again, but for the most part it was just wide open and awesome.
I got on the I-39 Tollway near Rochelle, paid my $3.60, and kept on rolling. I was 17 miles from Loves Park, about 12:30PM, when I got thirsty, pulled into a convenience store, and found my first real trouble for the day.
Tod and I met each other in junior high. He was already a hooligan and I was ready to convert into one. We’ve had some a few rough patches here and there, but we’ve been friends for 25 years now. There was a multiple year stretch after he moved back to Illinois where we fell out of touch, but when we got back together again, it was like old times. He came to Des Moines, and we did some riding, him on a Harley, me on a Suzuki C90T. We shared some stories our younger years with a few of my friends. I think they were surprised. They knew I am an asshole to this day and a very loyal friend, but they had never heard tales of my sometimes less than legal youthful ways.
Nowadays I try to get out toward Tod’s way a time or two each year and he comes my way when he can. I was looking forward to this visit, to get some time to share a meal, and have a chance to catch up.
I don’t remember the name of the convenience store, just that I got another Pepsi and I attempted to play a game of Super Pac-Man on a Multicade machine with a joystick that took my movement inputs as mere suggestions. After my first death I just walked away.
I sat down at a picnic table for a few minutes to catch up on texting/email/Facebook, but decided I needed to get moving after a few minutes. I tossed my trash, walked over to my bike, threw my leg over, hit the button to crank it up and…crank…crank…crank…crank…
All crank, no start. Son of a bitch.
I let it sit for a minute and tried again. Same thing. Tod owns a vehicle repair shop and is a mechanical genius so I gave him a call. He had me check a few things and I took the air cleaner cover off. He told me his good trailer borked up its bearings the previous night and the other one wasn’t really good for towing a bike. (I saw it later on, he wasn’t kidding. It might be good to haul a push lawn mower, but I wouldn’t even put a moped on that thing, much less a touring bike.)
We hung up for a minute so Tod could handle some business. Out of desperation I hit the starter button and the bike fired right up. I put the air cleaner cover back on and was about to throw my leg over when Tod called me back:
“I found a trailer-” he began but I cut him off.
“Nevermind. Can you hear it?”
“You got it started? How?”
“Hell if I know. I’m just gonna take off and not stop till I get to your shop.”
I got my gear put away and left as fast as I could. The bike ran fine all the way to my exit where 173 crosses I-39. It ran fine while I paid my $1.65 toll and it ran fine the final few miles to Tod’s shop across from the Rockford Speedway. When I got there I shut the bike off and hit the start button. It fired right up. I did again, it worked again. I did it a 3rd time and it fired up a 3rd time.
Tod and I talked for a while and then decided it was lunch time since we were starving. Tod got on his Harley, I got on mine. And then my bike wouldn’t start again.
I knew right then my goal of getting this trip done in one day was not going to happen.
Here is the Reader’s Digest condensed version of the next 6 hours:
– Tod and I ate lunch with a friend of his and had a good time
– Tod and I borrowed said friend’s trailer and took my bike to the local Harley dealership. I called Harley ahead of time, explained I was traveling from out of state, etc… and they said they would get me right in
– When we got to the Harley dealership they said it would be 2 days before they could look at it. I argued, advised I was told differently, and eventually they gave in.
– I coughed up $255 out of pocket for repairs that were actually covered by my warranty because, with one exception, this dealership had the worst service department I have ever seen.
– I got my bike back near 7 PM.
I slept at Tod’s place that night.
I woke the next morning at 6:30 when my alarm went off. I snoozed a few times until I eventually crawled out of bed a few minutes after 7. I hadn’t planned on this being an overnight trip so I didn’t have any extra clothes with me, no deodorant, no toothbrush or toothpaste. I showered and did the best I could with what I had available, but decided not to worry about it as I was going to be by myself the majority of the day anyway.
Tod made coffee and we took our cups outside to not wake his family. Tod’s wife Melanie and his son, Carson, had been at an amusement park until very late the previous day and I hadn’t seen them yet. By the time we filled our second cup, Carson came out and I learned all about roller coasters. He’s a cool little dude. Carson also learned a valuable life lesson this morning: When doing a fist bump with a biker, either don’t bump so hard or aim for the part of the fist without large pieces of metal jewelry on it. Melanie came out after a while and we all chatted up until I needed to get on the road around 10:30.
It never occurred to me to skip the rest of the trip and head for home. I had a goal and I wanted to see it achieved. I gassed up at the Marathon store just down the road from and ate a surprisingly good gas station double cheeseburger. I started the first podcast of the day, rode back north to Route 173, and headed East.
It was sunny and 72 degrees when I left. My time on Route 173 was mostly traveling a road surrounded by fields, occasionally interrupted by small towns. While I’m sure there is livestock in Illinois, I didn’t smell it once. Growing up in rural Iowa you just get used to the stench of animals bred for their food properties, but I can set it aside and ignore it at will due to years of practice. Instead all I smelled was crops and dew and trees and just an overall sense of clean.
I turned North on US-14 for a few miles before turning East again on Route 67 in Walworth. This eventually turned into Linton Drive and then into South Lake Shore Drive and that took me into Lake Geneva proper.
I got my first good look of Lake Geneva when I cruised by Big Foot Beach State Park. As you can see, it’s a big blue lake with some white boats on it:
Riding into Lake Geneva, its place as a tourist attraction becomes abundantly clear. There were people and traffic around the edges and middle of town, but once you get downtown where the hotels and shops are, the town gets packed. Hundreds of people all within an area of 5 or 6 blocks, with hotels, restaurants, bars, pubs, gift shops, and even a horse drawn buggy, all competing for your tourism dollar.
My first destination was Gary Gygax’s old home at 330 Center Street. I got stuck at a traffic light at the intersection of West Main and Center and it was a good three minutes before I could turn. The traffic lights don’t change much in this area and when they do, there is heavy traffic of both the car and foot variety to contend with.
Now I know three minutes doesn’t sound long, but it was 80 degrees by now, and I was stuck there with no shade, blue jeans, black motorcycle boots, and a black T-shirt covered by my black leather vest. On top of that, when I’m stopped, the heat from my engine shoots out the right side and part of it hits me in the leg.
Eventually I did turn onto Center Street and proceeded to ride right past the house and not even realize it. I just kept right on going. Here, just a few blocks from the numerous hotels and eateries, it looked like a small town with nice, quaint little houses with well-maintained lawns. I was so surprised at the immediate difference in landscape that I rode up to the 500 block before my brain kicked in. I turned myself around and rode back the way I came.
Confession time: I don’t play D&D anymore.
The first Tabletop RPG I ever played was D&D 3.5 and I had a fine time playing it with friends. For my first game, my friend Adam ran me through a short scenario where I was the only player. It involved werewolves, involuntary cannibalism, and a twist ending. It blew my mind. We played a few sessions over the next month or so with the others in the group and I had a great time.
For now though, life has limited my play time and it’s hard to find a day when everyone in the old group can even get together and play. And we refuse to play online since we’re all in the same town. Adam, his wife , myself and a co-worker tried out a Forgotten Realms campaign a few years back, but it died out after 10 or so sessions. Life had other plans for us again.
For now, my D20 fix is sated by playing at conventions in one shots. It’s not much, but it keeps me happy.
When riding back I saw the house and was positive that was it, but I still made sure to read the numbers on the porch. I knew it was the house, I’d seen pictures online, but for me, whenever I make a trip to see something like this, a place I’ve read about and have wanted to see in person… somehow it never seems real for the first few minutes. I pulled off to the side, directly in front of the house, shut the bike off, and walked across the street. I looked back at the house and took it in for a few minutes.
Dungeons and Dragons was invented here. Just a few steps across the street, around the side of the house, and down to the basement door that still has “Entrance Wargames Room” written on it. Inventing a game that ends up beloved by millions and essentially creates a new industry is truly monumental. Granted, it’s not curing cancer, but it is important. This is a place that, even though it doesn’t have a plaque or a marker, is considered by nearly every gamer to be the birthplace of something that went on to greatness.
People pay it homage. Most people will never get inside this house. They know that. Yet they, much like I’m doing right this moment, make trips, pilgrimages if you will, traveling hundreds of miles just to see it the outside of the house.
Let that sink in for a minute.
People travel hundreds of miles to see the outside of a house where a game (a game!) was invented.
Whatever your thoughts on the man himself, Gary Gygax did something amazing here. It is a testament to his vision that the game he created, the game that inspired so many others, lives on to this day.
After a while I took this picture:
Side view:
“It’s just a house.” some people would say. Wood and wire and paint and other materials. But because of what was created here, it’s more than just a house. It’s someplace special.
We’ve all heard the stories about how Gary Gygax chose Horticultural Hall for the first Gen Con because it was only a block from his house. I had always assumed it was a bit of an urban legend. I just figured it was somewhere near his house.
Turns out it is not an urban legend at all. Horticultural Hall really is, quite literally, 1 block away from Gary’s house. It is located at 330 Broad Street. If you came out the front door on Gary’s old house and used the sidewalk to get here, assuming you took your sweet time to mosey on over, it would take you under 2 minutes seconds to make the walk.
I couldn’t get a wide shot because there was a Farmer’s Market going on, but did get this on the entryway:
They had vendors inside and the doors were wide open so I wandered inside:
That pic makes it look about twice as big as it is. History has it that the first Gen Con had about 100 people attending. If they had had a few dozen more, they would have felt pretty crowded here.
After I took the above pic I wandered out into the entryway, and looked around in a slow circle. I haven’t been to Gen Con, but I’ve seen videos, read reports, and talked to friends and vendors who have attended. It’s a monster of a convention now and it came from here. “Humble beginnings,” I thought.
A group of people were headed into see the vendor wares so I stepped aside and walked back to my bike. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt a little sad and didn’t want to be there anymore.
The last place I wanted to visit in Lake Geneva was The Riviera. There is a brick in the pavement by the fountain near the entrance dedicated to Gary Gygax purchased by his family, friends, and fans. I didn’t even know it existed until a few weeks before the trip, but now that I did, I wasn’t missing it.
I rode the few blocks back down to find that, somehow, perhaps magically, traffic was even worse than before. The Riviera is right on the water, the road going by it is one way, and the other side of the road is full of eateries. I rode around that block a few times, but there was no parking to be found anywhere.
The fountain itself was just 25-30 yards off the road so I parked in a No Parking Zone and took a chance no one would ticket or tow me in the 2 minutes I needed to get my picture:
Thankfully there wasn’t any real history here for me to ponder so I took the picture and hustled my ass back to my bike, fired it up, and headed home.
When I was back on the road my thoughts wandered back to Horticultural Hall. Why was I sad? It didn’t make any sense. For me, places like this, places that are a bit famous, even if only to a a certain niche of people, they have this subtle magic, almost an aura left behind by the history that has taken place there.
Eventually I decided that I was there, having a moment in a gaming mecca, feeling the magic, the aura… and these people just wanted to buy sweet corn and homemade jellies. I wondered how many shoppers at the Farmer’s Market had any idea of the gaming history of Horticultural Hall or the house located 1 block away. If they were local, sure. Other than that? Probably none.
The ride home was, thankfully, uneventful. I had a B.A.C.A child ride that night and had to be at the meeting location at 6PM. When I put the address for it in the GPS, it said I had to travel 331 miles and the arrival time was 6:09PM. That doesn’t take into account any stops I would need to make.
I didn’t mess around, kept the throttle rolled pretty high, and even with an out of my way gas stop in Lyndon, IL, I turned off on the 2nd St exit in Des Moines at 5:45PM. As I turned off the exit and headed up 2nd St, in my mirror I saw a bike a few blocks back at a light. By the time the bike had caught up to me a few stoplights later I had already recognized it as one of my B.A.C.A. brothers. He pulled up behind me on my left and we rode to the meeting point in the staggered formation. When we got there, we already had family waiting for us.
Post-trip Update: They day after I got home I took all my repair paperwork into my local Harley dealership. Later that same day the warranty company called me and said there would cut me a check for the money I spent, minus my $50 deductible and about $20 in non-covered parts.
Thinking it will get warm “soon enough” is always stupid thinking. I knew better, but went on anyway. Learn from my mistakes, folks.
I took some notes when I got home and then wrote this up the following week.
Overall, I had a fun time on this trip and would not hesitate to visit Lake Geneva again in the future. There is plenty of great riding to be had in Illinois and Wisconsin.