Signs of the Ice Age in Wisconsin's Kettle Moraine

The Kettle Moraine Scenic Drive's green-and-white acorn-shaped signs are easy to spot, often tacked to plain wooden posts at the edge of a field where two country roads intersect.

Some of the signs looked so picture-perfect — framed by wildflowers, snaking vines and tall grasses — that I stopped to take a photo.

[...] those friendly old-school Kettle Moraine signs became my lodestars, making it easy to follow a meandering route through a rustic landscape of farms, forests, wetlands and prairie.

All I did was experience the landscape, stopping dozens of times just to gaze at a lonely farmhouse or take a closer look at a colorful flower swaying in the breeze by the side of the road.

In addition to signs for the Kettle Moraine, when you drive through the area you'll also encounter signs for the Ice Age National Scenic Trail, a 1,000-mile route located entirely within Wisconsin.

On a trail at Butler Lake, just steps from the parking lot, I walked on an esker — a ridge formed by retreating glaciers, with steep slopes on either side of the path and a kettle lake, formed when soil covered a large piece of ice that eventually melted.