Internet travel-zine Vagabondish publishes today my take on how to best enjoy a weekend in the city where I live. Here’s a teaser:
A FEW YEARS AGO, I couldn’t have pointed to Madison on a map (for those of you still looking, it’s the capitol of Wisconsin). Like the many Americans who populate the coasts, the Midwest to me was flyover country – nothing but a great, grey mass between Seattle and New York.
But things have changed, and as chance would have it, Madison has become my home. The city is a bubble in the middle of rural America, a flourishing, liberal urban center squeezed between two gorgeous lakes; outside the limits are miles of dairy farms and cornfields, but you’d never guess it.
Madison is beautiful because of its simplicity – it doesn’t try to be Chicago or Milwaukee, nor does it let itself be pigeonholed as a college town, despite the fact that the University of Wisconsin is half of its beating heart. It is a city with a conscious, with people who are proud of where they live and show their love through supporting local business, local agriculture, and more basically, one another. It has the friendly character of the Midwest without the often-associated kitsch, and a natural beauty that is worth traveling from afar to see.
Check out the full story here.
I love that piece – it really makes me miss home! NYC is great, but there’s nothing like Madison.
Since we’ve lived in Chicago we’ve been up to Madison twice and enjoyed it both times. The city is lovely and you truly evoke it’s spirit in this article! I LOVE Vagabondish….