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Wisconsin River to Kickapoo

Wisconsin River to Kickapoo is 38.5 miles of point-to-point riding through Crawford County in Wisconsin — the Coulee Region, the coulees, ridge tops and river bluffs of south-west Wisconsin. Moving time is about 45 minutes; allow 65 with stops — a half morning. It is scored CS-4, Twisty: 68 corners, 149° of turning per mile, 1,759 feet of climbing. The roads it uses, in the order you ride them, are in the app.

Curviness
CS-4Twisty · 1.77/mi
Distance
38.5 mi45 min riding
Corners
6831% sharp · Sweeping
Climbing
1,759 ft46 ft/mi · Steep
Shape
Point-to-pointHalf morning
Roads
Mixed roads23% county & local
Traffic
800vehicles a day, median
Speed limit
55 mphtypically 55
Open this route in the app

About this road

Connecting the Wisconsin River with the Kickapoo system through Crawford County’s intricate hills produces high curviness and sustained interest from constantly changing topography. The Wisconsin River corridor carries its own history of transportation and settlement; the Kickapoo feels more intimate. Technical, scenic, and continuously engaging, the ride invites comparison of the two river systems’ different scales and moods. The demand is genuine and continuous, forced by the dissected landform. Ideal for riders who want continuous engagement with complex topography and the satisfaction of linking the Wisconsin River and the Kickapoo in a single effort. Services are sparse in the middle miles; preparation matters. The changing character of the landscape keeps the geometry and the scenery in constant conversation. Two rivers, one complex landscape in Crawford County. The roads make the comparison physical.

How it rides

68 corners over 38.5 miles — 1.77 a mile, and 149° of turning for every mile ridden. That scores CS-4, Twisty on the five-point curviness scale. 31% of those corners are sharp ones, and the road reads as sweeping.

What it climbs

The road climbs 1,759 feet in total, 46 feet per mile, between 644 and 1,252 feet — 608 feet of relief. The longest single climb is 538 feet over 3.3 miles, and the steepest grade on it is 10.5%. By Driftless standards that is steep.

Surface, speed and traffic

Paved end to end. 23% of it is back road rather than highway, the other 77% state or US route. Posted speeds run to 55 mph, typically 55, measured across 61% of the route. Where traffic counts exist — 20% of the miles — the median is 800 vehicles a day, busiest at mile 18.6 with 2,100.

Where to stop

3 of the towns on this road have somewhere to stop — 3 fuel, 2 food, 3 bars.

Longest stretch without fuel: 38.3 miles. Worth knowing before you set off if your tank is small.

Listed alphabetically, and chosen by us rather than rated by anybody. The order you reach them, and the mile each one sits at, are in the app.

Turn-by-turn directions and the spoken guidance are in the app. Every figure on this page is measured from the route itself — corner counts and gradients from the road geometry, elevation from the national elevation dataset, traffic from the state transport departments where counts exist.

Nearby roads