The Great River Road is perfect for a great Wisconsin road trip

This is how road trips should be.

Windows down, music up, the muddy Mississippi River to my left and towering, forested bluffs to my right.  

The Great River Road is a highway that was built for road trips — the kind where the drive is as great as the stops along the way. 

Behind me was Wyalusing State Park, where I had watched bald eagles soaring on the thermals at eye level with my campsite and the sun setting over the confluence of the Mississippi and Wisconsin Rivers. 

RELATED:Mighty river views abound at Wyalusing State Park

Ahead of me were dozens of small towns (and one big college town), a few state and local parks with more majestic views and bald eagles, a handful of wineries and a historical B&B.

Great Wisconsin summer road trip: commence. 

A great road 

The Great River Road, established in 1938, stretches for 3,000 miles through 10 states along the Mississippi River. Green signs with a ship's wheel mark the route from "Canada to Gulf." 

Wisconsin's portion of the road, Highway 35, traces the river for 250 miles from Kieler in the southwest corner of the state to Prescott, where the St. Croix River dumps into the Mississippi. It's a state scenic byway and Wisconsin's only national scenic byway.

In 2012, readers of Huffington Post voted it as America's "prettiest drive." It beat out other scenic beauties including the Road to Hana in Maui and the Big Sur Coastal Drive in California.  

Sherry Quamme, who chairs the Crawford County Tourism Council as well as the Wisconsin Mississippi River Parkway Commission, which helps preserve and promote the road, had given me a number of suggestions for my trip. I started with one of those at St. Feriole Island in Prairie du Chien.  

The city was first built on this island, separated from the mainland by a backwater channel of the Mississippi. Devastating floods chased out the last residents in the mid 20th century, and today it's home to a beautiful riverside park; Villa Louis, a Victorian estate dating to the 1840s that is now a state historic site; and a number of other historical buildings including the 1864 Dousman Hotel.  

From Prairie du Chien I continued north to Lynxville, where Quamme had suggested I stop at the Dawg House, which she described as "an upscale roadside eatery."  

The bright yellow-and-red building was closed for the day, but Mark Schneden, whose wife, Kim, runs the restaurant, stepped outside to chat.  

"This river draws so many people, it's unbelievable," he said. 

Once kids are out of school, he said, traffic picks up as people come for fishing tournaments and sightseeing along the river.  

Schneden also pointed out islands in the river and told me of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Upper Mississippi River Restoration project, which is working to restore islands for wildlife such as tundra swans, Canada geese and eagles.  

The Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge protects 261 river miles from the river's confluence with the Chippewa River near Pepin to Rock Island, Ill. The refuge is part of the Mississippi Flyway, a major bird migration route. Some 40% of migrating North American waterfowl and shorebirds use the route.

I saw countless eagles as I continued north through Ferryville, where Rush Creek State Natural Area is a good spot to stretch the legs and take in views of the river from an open bluff.

RELATED:Majestic Mississippi River views await at Rush Creek

Not all of the Great River Road hugs the Mississippi River — Highway 35 occasionally dips inland, the bluffs flattening out into farmland that obscures views of the river. 

But this southern stretch of the road, from just north of Prairie du Chien to past Stoddard, parallels the river for the most part, making it a good segment to drive at a leisurely pace to fully take in views of the river and the 100- to 600-foot limestone-capped bluffs.

At Genoa I had to divert inland for another trip through the Driftless Region, saving the road's northern portion for a few days later.  

RELATED:The Driftless Region's Kickapoo Valley is a hilly paradise in western Wisconsin

North of La Crosse

Back on the road in La Crosse, I added one thing my southern Great River Road trip was missing: a hitchhiker. 

One I knew, of course (don't worry, Mom).   

After a beer at Pearl Street Brewery, I picked up friend and fellow Journal Sentinel reporter Katie O'Connell at the Amtrak station.  

We drove north out of La Crosse and stopped for the famed walnut burgers at The Historic Trempealeau Hotel. Built in 1871, the building was one of only a few in the town to survive a fire in 1888. Views of the Mississippi River abound from the dining room, three-season porch and deck. Trains rumbling past on tracks that seem dangerously close are a reminder of the building's past as a boarding house.  

North of town is Perrot State Park, home for the night. Our campsite (47) was a good private one on Trempealeau Bay, but just a few down from us was one of the best in the campground. Site 44 boasts views of the bay and the setting sun (our views were obscured by trees) — mark it as one to book on future trips.  

The next morning we hiked up the 520-foot Brady's Bluff for terrific views of the Mississippi River and 388-foot Trempealeau Mountain, which separates the river from the bay.

The half-mile West Brady's Bluff Trail is a steep and challenging ascent up the bluff, with stone steps carved into the bluff by the young men of the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s.  

The less-than-one-mile trail down the east side of the bluff is a more gradual descent (or ascent), following switchbacks on the bluff with constant views of the river.  

Back at the park headquarters, we connected with the wooded Riverview Trail to loop back to the car.  

Perrot would be a great home base for a bike trip in the area. A short spur trail from the campground connects with the Great River State Trail, a 24-mile crushed limestone trail that follows an old railroad line from La Crosse north along the Mississippi to the Trempealeau National Wildlife Refuge.  

If we had our bikes, it would have been an easy, 4-mile ride partially along that trail to Elmaro Vineyard, our first stop on the Great River Road Wine Trail. 

The trail comprises 11 wineries along the Mississippi River in Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota.  

RELATED:Following the Great River Road to delicious discovery

Elmaro, the 2016 Wisconsin winery of the year, is the southernmost of the five Wisconsin offerings. When we arrived, owner Lynita Docken-Delaney was busy behind the tasting bar, impressed by a group of women who were interested in the winery's Marquette, one of only a few dry red offerings, aged in oak for two years.  

The wine was as good as the view from the patio overlooking the vineyards and tents being set up for the winery's Country Wine Tour, an annual event pairing wines from around the world with food. 

As good Irish and Milwaukee women, however, we had a date with beer and our homeland farther north.

In Fountain, the Irish-infused Monarch Public House, built in 1894, claims to be the oldest continuously operating tavern in Wisconsin.  

If this were pre-1960, we wouldn't have been allowed in the building, which was constructed by the Odd Fellows.

Today everyone is welcome to sidle up to the historic bar, which serves its own beers under the Fountain City Brewing Co. moniker, including an American-style gold lager brewed using a recipe dating back to 1856. 

After a quick stop at the Seven Hawks Vineyards tasting room down the street (the winery's vineyard is about a mile up the road and isn't open to the public), we continued north along Highway 35 to Alma.  

There Danzinger Vineyards offers the best views of the Wisconsin Great River Road wineries, perched on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi in the distance.  

"Beautiful views, healthy pours," Katie quipped as we sat on the patio and enjoyed the views and music from Larry Past, a singer-songwriter from Eau Claire.  

We purchased a bottle of Mississippi Mist, a sweet white, to take back to the Tritsch House in Alma, home for the next two nights.  

The Queen Anne Victorian was built in 1902 by Frank Tritsch and is now run by 33-year-old Johnny Elliott. 

The bed and breakfast is a tasteful mix of past and present, with flat-screen TVs, cable and Wi-Fi in each of the five rooms; original stained-glass windows and woodwork; and four porches, one on the second level with views of the river — where we would watch the sunset while sipping wine.  

We picked up more for the occasion the next day at Villa Bellezza to the north in Pepin.  

The beautiful, Mediterranean-style winery recently opened a restaurant, il Forno, and the wood-fired pizza was a perfect complement to the setting. A little rain couldn't even ruin the mood, as outdoor heaters kept us warm on the chilly summer day.  

From the winery we diverted off the Great River Road for a worthy side trip: the Little House Wayside.  

A historical marker and re-created cabin mark the spot where Wisconsin author Laura Ingalls Wilder was born and the setting of her first book in the Little House series, "Little House in the Big Woods." 

After channeling our inner book nerd, it was on to the final winery stop.

Apple trees line the driveway into the Maiden Rock Winery & Cidery, which crafts a rotating roster of sweet to dry hard ciders and wines using all Wisconsin fruit. The cooler weather plus cider almost tricked us into thinking it was fall in Wisconsin, which would be a perfect time to visit this spot.  

Back on the road, I make a rookie road trip mistake in getting to our next stop, Maiden Rock Bluff State Natural Area.  

Don't follow Google Maps – it will take you back to Stockholm and up the Great River Road to a pullout with a historical marker below the bluff.  

Instead, head just down the road from the cidery and turn right (west) onto Long Lane, which dead ends at a small parking lot for Maiden Rock Bluff State Natural Area.  

The state natural area is rustic, with rough social paths and old service roads weaving through prairie and oak savanna to the top of Maiden Rock. The nearly mile-long bluff rises 400 feet above Lake Pepin (a wide spot in the Mississippi) and is one of only six bluffs on the river where peregrine falcons nest naturally.

We didn't see any falcons, but the views were enough of a treat and a reminder that even on the "prettiest drive" in America, you need to get out of your car every once in a while to fully enjoy what the area has to offer.  

RELATED:Things to do along Wisconsin's Great River Road