Wissota State Park at Chippewa Falls, WI

Wednesday, Aug 6

Today we move from Wisconsin Dells to Wissota State Park at Chippewa Falls.  Shortly after we left Wisconsin Dells we saw the following rock formations.

I was surprised I got the camera in time to get this picture.  I decided to leave the camera on for a little bit .  

I'm glad I did.  Suddenly there was this.  I took both the above pictures from inside the coach.

As we got closer to western Wisconsin we got into rolling hills with beautiful farms.

Here is an example of both a crop field and rolling hill.  There's more to come.

Another corn field.  Most of the corn grown is feed for the dairy cows in the area.  The cheese  made in Wisconsin is great also.

This marina is on Lake Wissota very close to the state park.  We are almost there.

Yeaaa!  We have arrived.

This site may look a little tight, but we do have all slides open and the big awning open.

This is our yard.  It is nice sized.  It is peaceful here even with a fair number of other campers.

Thursday, Aug 7
We saw an ad on TV for the US Championship Chainsaw Woodcarving competition starting today in Eau Clair, WI.  It was free to attend today, so we went.  There are 10 competitors; with 7 from the US and 2 from Japan and 1 from Wales.  We were told each had 25 hours to complete their sculpture.

Paul Bunyan was there with his blue ox to greet everyone.

This guy is making an Atlas or Zeus type of sculpture.  This is the first carving we saw. The following 3 pictures are progress on this sculpture.

We're not sure what a violin has to do with the man, but the same sculptor was working it.

 Here he is working on the head he cut off the sculpture.  Apparently it will be glued on later.

Apparently they are allowed to use tools that are not chainsaws.

This man is creating a bear taller than him.  Look how tiny the chainsaw is.  He is working on the bear's paw right now.  This sculptor seemed to make the most progress as we were watching so we have the most pictures of this project. The following 5 pictures are the progress we saw in the time we were there.

OMG he suddenly cut the bear's head off and started working on the inside.

Now he is carving out most of the inside of the head.

Here he actually made an opening that went from inside the mouth thru the head.

Here he is putting more detail around the mouth and teeth.
 

This guy is 1 of the 2 from Japan.  He is doing a very tall owl with what looks like a bear at the bottom.

A couple of hours later, this is what it looked like from the back.

This is the only female sculptor.  Looks like there is a tiger at one end and not sure what is at the other end yet.

This was about an hour later.  Still not sure what the black paint marks are.  Wish we could see the final works tomorrow, but we cannot stay at the park any longer so must move.

We are not at all sure what this is going to be.  You can tell the large top piece of wood that is at a right angle is glued on.  Interesting. The following 3 pictures are the progress we saw.

Can you see the elk face and head also?

On the opposite side from the elk you can see a turtle.  We are not sure what the other is yet.

 

This guy was creating 2 eagles and a bear at the bottom best we could tell.

 Side view

Now the bear is more defined.

Best we can tell this is going to be a lone eagle.  

Well we were wrong. Looks like there will be something else at the bottom.  Also in the center right front side of the picture are the wings that will be glued on later.  We were surprised at all the gluing that is being done.

This is a unique carving done by the other guy from Japan.  We were told this guy one the competition for the last 2 years.  We are guessing at all the animals on this based on pictures the sculptor has laying around.  There is a hippo with a large snake on its head.  On the side are going to be 3 lemur monkeys.  At the back is a large turtle with a sloth laying over the top of it. Below is how it looked just before we left.

The 10 competitors are all under this large tent.  Off to the side were a few other carvers.

These had a safety net between them and the people able to walk by.  This is another female chainsaw carver at the event.

This was on display but no one around.

Wow look what happened in about an hour or so.

This is the same sculpture as above, just from the side.  Today, attendance was free, the rest of the week there is a fee to attend.  The finished sculptures will be auctioned off, with the money split, with 50% going to charity and the rest to the winning competitors.

Tomorrow, we cross the Mississippi River into Minnesota.