Shannon O'Brien Travel Itineraries

The best destinations

Photo of Wisconsin
Photo of Wisconsin

The Best of Wisconsin

#68 best destination in the world

Map view

University of Wisconsin–Madison Arboretum

Photo of Madison

Walk difficulty: Easy

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • The University of Wisconsin–Madison Arboretum is the site of historic research in ecological restoration
  • The Arboretum manages remnant forests and prairies throughout Wisconsin
  • In addition to being a research facility, the Arboretum includes 20 miles of hiking trails, and 3 miles of biking roads

Green Bay Botanical Garden

Photo of Green Bay

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • Nonprofit botanical garden located in Green Bay, that contains several themed areas
  • Some of the features include a Wisconsin interpretation of an English cottage garden; a children's garden, with a tree house, slide, maze, and sundial; and an informal garden of native trees, shrubs and wild flowers

Milwaukee Public Market

Photo of Milwaukee

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • Public market located in Milwaukee, where space in the building is leased to vendors, primarily local food businesses
  • The market's founders drew inspiration for the development from the Pike Place Market in Seattle, Washington, envisioning a space that would support smaller, local businesses
  • Typical food offerings include bakery items, meats, produce, seafood, soup, cheese, spices, wine, coffee, and candies

Bay Beach Amusement Park

Photo of Bay Beach Amusement Park

Best time to visit: June-Aug

Cost: $

  • Municipal amusement park in Green Bay that contains rides, concessions, a roller coaster, and a food pavilion
  • Dances, movies, and other events are held in a pavilion

Bay View and Woods Trail Loop, Big Bay State Park

Photo of Big Bay State Park

Walk difficulty: Easy

Best time to visit: June-Aug

Cost: $

  • State park on Madeline Island, in Lake Superior
  • The park has picturesque sandstone bluffs and caves and a sand beach
  • It encloses unique habitat types including lakeside dunes, sphagnum bogs, and old-growth forest
  • Bald eagles return annually to the park to nest and rear offspring

Cave Point Lakeside Trail, Cave Point County Park

Photo of Cave Point County Park

Walk difficulty: Easy

Best time to visit: June-Aug

Cost: $

  • Park featuring underwater caves, hiking trails, and limestone cliffs along scenic Lake Michigan

Meyers Beach Sea Cave Trail, Apostle Islands National Lakeshore

Photo of Apostle Islands National Lakeshore

Walk difficulty: Moderate

Best time to visit: June-Aug

Cost: $

  • National lakeshore consisting of 21 islands (Apostle Islands), on the shore of Lake Superior
  • It is known for its collection of historic lighthouses, sandstone sea caves, a few old-growth remnant forests, and natural animal habitats
  • Larger wildlife on the islands and surrounding area include whitetail deer, black bear, red fox, and coyote

Phoenix Park, Eau Claire

Photo of Eau Claire

Best time to visit: June-Aug

Cost: $

  • Public space in downtown Eau Claire, at the confluence of the Chippewa River and the Eau Claire River
  • The park also offers a walking labyrinth, a natural amphitheater, and is home to Eau Claire's year-round farmer's market

Eagle Trail, Peninsula State Park

Photo of Peninsula State Park

Walk difficulty: Moderate

Best time to visit: June-Aug

Cost: $

  • Peninsula State Park is the third largest state park in Wisconsin
  • Considered Wisconsin's most complete park, Peninsula has 468 campsites, three group camps, a summer theater, an 18-hole golf course, sand beach, biking, hiking and ski trails, 150-foot bluffs, a lighthouse and eight miles of Door County shoreline

Milwaukee Art Museum

Photo of Milwaukee Art Museum

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • Art museum in Milwaukee with a collection that contains nearly 25,000 works of art
  • The museum houses works from antiquity to the present
  • Included in the collection are 15th- to 20th-century European and 17th- to 20th-century American paintings, sculpture, prints, drawings, decorative arts, photographs, and folk and self-taught art
  • Among the best in the collection are the museum's holding of American decorative arts, German Expressionism, folk and Haitian art, and American art after 1960

Devil's Lake via West Bluff Trail, Devil's Lake State Park

Photo of Devil's Lake State Park

Walk difficulty: Moderate

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • State park located on the western edge of the last ice-sheet deposited during the Wisconsin glaciation
  • The state park is the largest in Wisconsin, and is known for its 500-foot-high (150 m) quartzite bluffs along Devil's Lake
  • Devil's Lake was created by a glacier depositing terminal moraines that plugged the north and south ends of the gap in the bluffs during the last ice age approximately 12,000 years ago
  • The sand at the bottom of Devil's Lake is thought to be deposited by glaciers

Ice Age Trail HWY 67 Trailhead, Kettle Moraine State Forest Southern Unit

Photo of Kettle Moraine State Forest Southern Unit

Walk difficulty: Easy

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • National Scenic Trail stretching 1,200 miles (1,900 km) through Wisconsin
  • The trail roughly follows the location of the terminal moraine from the last Ice Age
  • Numerous species of mammals can be seen along the trail, including red fox, American red squirrel, white-tailed deer, porcupine, black bear and grey wolf

Taliesin

Photo of Taliesin

Best time to visit: May-Nov

Cost: $

  • Property completed in 1911, located south of the village of Spring Green, that was the estate of American architect Frank Lloyd Wright and an extended exemplar of the Prairie School of architecture
  • The 600-acre (240 ha) property was developed on land that originally belonged to Wright's maternal family
  • The design of the original building was consistent with the design principles of the Prairie School, emulating the flatness of the plains and the natural limestone outcroppings of Wisconsin's Driftless Area