January road trip to Wisconsin

It was a Friday night in early January and my work was done at my real job for the week and I was ready to begin a new road trip adventure. I had found a rare and hard to find vintage car engine for sale on the HAMB message board for hot rodders that I belong to and wanted to go to Wisconsin to bring it home. This time my old high school buddy Jon Humbyrd from the Tulsa, Oklahoma area had made the 4 hour drive here to accompany me. And along the way he had stopped and picked up another very desirable hot rod engine that I had bought from member Dr. Frankensickle (Jay) and we unloaded it from his truck. Mrs PF had a big meatloaf supper ready to eat when we got to the house and then we hit the road.

 It took us about 3 hours or so to reach the Independence, MO area of Kansas City and had arranged to pick up some 1930's Chevy fenders that member 34Toddster (Steve) had sold to a member in Wisconsin named II Funny (Kip). We often help each other with what we call a HAMB relay to move parts around the country for free and Steve had left the fenders with another mutual friend and HAMB member Airstream Dan and we met him and his lovely wife Sharyl at the Cracker Barrel restaurant late that night to get them. My daughter Kristina lives near there too and met us as well. So after some coffee and dessert we said goodbye to them and began our long journey north. Before we left Sharyl gave me a bag of homemade brittle candy she had just made that night and had used cashews instead of peanuts and it was good stuff. 
Our next stop was in the Davenport, Iowa area at the Machine Shed for breakfast and we were the first ones there when the door was opened at 6 am that morning. 

The food was great and so was the hot coffee on this very cold morning and then we continued on a east and north direction. Not too long afterward we arrived in the pleasant town of Dixon, IL and stopped to visit the boyhood home of President Ronald Reagan and took some outside photos as it was too early for it to be open yet that Saturday morning.

And before we left, I posed for this photo with his statue...I call it "The Gipper and Me."

Then we followed the scenic Rock river towards Rockford, Il and then Beloit, WI instead of taking the more boring IL turnpike. Soon we arrived at the country home and shop where the fenders were to be delivered.  Kip was there to meet us at his Dad's shop.

His brother and some of their buddies were there too on this Saturday morning.
 Shown in this photo are Hamb members II Funny, 1bad32sedan, stroked stang 331, and 91 whitestang.

We had a fun visit and looked at the 31 Chevy drag race hot rod project in this shop...

Before we left Kip presented me with a nice gift of a rhubarb pie his mom had made for him to give me. It looked great and I saved it for later. Thank you Mom !!

Soon we were back on the road again and only went 15 miles or so until arriving at Janesville, WI at Gil-Bar Farm which is a well known purebred Jersey cow dairy farm to look at the cows owned by my old friends the Barlass family who sadly were not home that morning but we were able to look around the barn and was a fun diversion for Jon and I since we both came from Jersey dairy farms ourselves.

That was fun and something different from the norm for us and then we traveled a short distance to the Madison, WI area where we met up with HAMB member and Facebook friend Cloned Clown (Nate) at the Cracker Barrel there for a light lunch and a chance to visit. Nate brought his young son Matthew (Little Clown) and I took this photo of them.

And before we left, Nate gave me this cool decal from a local pie bakery as a gift. I guess everyone seems to know that I do indeed "love pie." Thanks guys and thank you for buying our lunch too.

Back on the road again, we drove another 40 miles or so to the Mauston, WI area and arrived at the country home and shop of member Dizzie (Bob) who had sold me a 1940's Buick straight eight engine.

It was cold and windy but his shop was heated and we looked around at his soon to be finished 34 Ford pickup truck project with a Buick 401 nail head engine.

Bob showed us his stunning Chevy pickup that we loved and could have stared at all day....he built it himself and even did the paint and interior work.

And after we loaded my new engine he took us up to the nearby junkyard owned by his friends where we looked at the 250 old cars on foot and it was getting cold....

By now it was getting late afternoon and we bid our new friend Bob farewell.

We called it a day at this point and went to our nearby motel room and after supper we hit the sack early. Then it was back on the road again a 1 am for the 12.5 hour drive home on Sunday. 
Arriving back home at the Flats, it was time for pie and coffee with Mrs. PF while Jon left for his 4 hour drive time back to Tulsa.

That about wraps up our weekend adventure and thank you for riding along...