Day 5 9-13 House on the Rock

Welcome to Wisconsin!
Home to America's Best Cheese...
 
 
 

There are big cheese stores at every exit on the Interstate.


The House on the Rock:

Today is a trip to “The House on the Rock” just outside Spring Green, WI.  The house was designed and built by Alex Jordan Jr.  He first fell in love with the location on a picnic and actually rented the site for $20 so the family (his mom and dad) could go there.  When the property went up for sale he purchased it and started building the house. 

Eclectic  adjective eclec·tic \e-ˈklek-tik, i-\: including things taken from many different sources.  That pretty much sums up the House on the Rock.
 

The House:

 

We were a bit surprised when this house located in the hill country west of Madison was decorated entirely in Asian décor.  While Jordan was 6’4” tall there were places that I had to crouch to keep from hitting the ceiling at 6’ even.    The house was very dark and almost impossible to get pictures.  

 



This animated ensemble was in a sitting room
next to the kitchen.  It was continuously playing music.

Cooktop in kitchen



The Infinity Room:
We took a walk out the Infinity Room that cantilevers over a sixty foot drop to the forest floor.  The balance weight for the room is made from 105 cubic yards of concrete.

 

In addition to the house there is a collection of things from all over the world.  There are two gun rooms with antiques from the Blunderbuss up to the Wild West.  There are entire rooms (each a museum in itself) featuring dolls and doll houses, miniature and full size circus displays, music boxes, complete animated orchestra. And that list doesn’t come close to describing what all there is to see.  We got there around 9:30A and left at around 3:00P and were on our feet almost the whole time.  We were exhausted.



Fire Power!

Display in the Men's Room.

  

Faberge Collection








This display of bottles graced the walls of the Lady's Room

There is an indoor turn of the century village with shops of every description:



Barber Shop

There was a section dedicated to all things nautical: including a whale that was about 80 feet long (3 stories high) being attacked by a giant octopus. 




















Huge steam tractor



A real royal coach.  This is not a model.

Music: There was some form of music in every room.  Some were pianos many were animated musical contraptions.  There is even a complete orchestra that is all animated. Most had boxes where you could put in tokens and the music would play.

Automated banjo

These figures are life-size about six feet tall.

This picture only captures about half of the orchestra!

The largest organ panel we have ever seen

The Carousel:

The highlight of the whole experience was the big carousel. 

The carousel at the House on the Rock, located near Dodgeville and Spring Green, Wisconsin in Iowa County, is claimed to be "the world's largest indoor carousel". The carousel features 269 carousel animals, 182 chandeliers, over 20,000 lights, and hundreds of mannequin angels hanging from the ceiling. ^[wikipedia] 

  
 

  
 

 The best way to see what we saw is Goggle House on the Rock and select images.  They will be in full light where most of the pixs we took came out very dark. 

 

 

We arrived back at the campground around 4:30 and are ready to call it a day.