WHERE: Wisconsin Dells->Warrens(Cranberry Fest)->Wisconsin Rapids WEATHER: Clear skies & 64*
We get up at 6:00, pack up and check out and on the road at 6:45. We gather everybody at JellyStone Park to go into the Cranberry Fest to park the cars together. It is one HUGE craft fair with the theme being cranberries, but it is also just prior to the holidays. We see several things of interest to buy, but not having a car here and flying home we gather ideas instead of items.
We go on the bus tour out to the cranberry marshes/bogs and learn the history of how cranberries are grown and harvested. They like this area for several reasons: the abundance of water and the sandy acidic soil. The productive life of the plants is an average of 50 years and they do not require rotating the crops to replenish nutrients into the soil. When the plants are first planted it takes about 5 years to reach their productive maturity. Most of the cranberries grown here go to the Ocean Spray plant.
Dry field of cranberries growing 
Cranberries ready for harvest
Flooded field of cranberries 
Cranberries floating in flooded field
Some of the machines used to harvest the cranberries:
We buy some cranberry wine and some dried cranberries with cinnamon, both are good. When we get off the tour Rick and I get a feeling of what it is like to retrieve cranberries from a flooded bog. It was fun!
Rick getting some help getting on his waders. 
Lori putting on her work gear!
We finish our time at the Cranberry Fest by Rick finding and buying me Cranberry Cream Puffs!
We leave and are told the highway to Wisconsin Rapids is closed but we make it to the hotel. Rick invites people to our room for some wine, beer and cheese and crackers prior to finishing the day with a dinner at the hotel.