Fall getaway in Lake Geneva: Day 3

Tuesday, October 20

Our final morning! We only had 2 nights here, but with the earlier start on Sunday, we packed a ton of fall into these ~52 hours away.

Coffee shop

Check out wasn’t until 11 a.m., and we fully intended to check out at 11 a.m. to maximize our time. I naturally woke up around 7 and by 7:30 was going to slip out to the coffee shop nearby, but then Ivan woke up, too, so he joined me.

The air was crisp yet and the short walk felt good. The coffee shop- Boxed and Burlap– looked so cute!

It was absolutely as cute as I’d hoped. We got our tea/ coffee and I wrote my blog post while Ivan just puttered around doing… not sure, but we had some mostly quiet time, together.

The upstairs is this adorable ‘speakeasy’ where I would have LOVED to sit and read in one of those chairs for a while! There’s also a little desk hidden around the corner there.

We opted for the bigger table downstairs, though.

We stayed a long while, and eventually headed back in time to shower and pack up.

Yerkes Observatory

We still had the whole day off, the weather was perfect, and we had no real reason to rush home, so we planned to stay in Lake Geneva a while longer.

I had wanted to check out the very nearby Yerkes Observatory, which is the home to the world’s largest refracting telescope. I did not know that this place existed just an hour or so from my home! Apparently it is known as “the birthplace of modern astrophysics” and was founded way back in 1892. Albert Einstein even visited it on his first trip to the United States in 1921. It is a beautiful Romanesque style building and the grounds were landscaped and designed by the creators of Central Park.

We just mostly wanted to see the outside and walk the grounds, but I would like to go back someday and actually tour it! It looks super cool. The Night Sky tours are all sold out for 2026 but I would love to actually be able to see through the telescope….

We walked all around the outside.

I hadn’t actually realized there was a pretty extensive set of trails on the grounds (free to the public). No one else was there, so we had the place to ourselves.

We saw 3 deer up really close!! (I mean, I obviously zoomed in here, but still- they were quite close!)

Loved this pretty yellow tree!

We walked for I’d say a good hour through the wooded trails. It was so nice! I actually got hot by the end and had to take my zipped sweater off.

Rustic Road 29

After Yerkes Observatory, we were getting pretty ready for lunch soon. On the way back to downtown Lake Geneva, we did a slight detour to drive on Rustic Road 29. It’s a beautiful scenic route (only 2.7 miles) that basically juts off the main road. I had read that it’s particularly spectacular in autumn.

And it was! It was so, so pretty. 😍 There was almost no traffic, so we took it nice and slow and paused here and there for photos.

I don’t really have much to say here… I think the photos speak for themselves. 🙂 Very glad I found this and that we did this.

The end of the route spit us right back out on Hwy 50, just a few minutes then from downtown Lake Geneva.

We parked and headed straight back to Flat Iron Tap, where we ate on Sunday. We basically wanted an exact repeat! Haha.

I got another Oktoberfest, Ivan got another Dankenstein’s Monster IPA, and we shared another grilled chicken sandwich with the habanero cheese and fresh jalapenos. Mmmm. It was still so, so good.

The only difference is that this time, I still felt just a little hungry at the end… so we got their peanut butter/ chocolate cake dessert. Figured any chance at particularly ‘healthy eating’ or ‘sticking to macros’ had been kinda shot to heck already, and it was our last meal of the trip, so…. YOLO. 😉

Final lakeshore walk

I then rebounded from “not quite full” to “a bit TOO full”, lol, so after lunch we decided to go for one final stroll along the lake. This time we headed left, in the opposite direction from our first walk on Sunday. I liked this route even better I think.

Right about here, we ironically ran into Ethan’s tennis partner’s parents!! Haha, what are the odds?! They were also on a little fall getaway, though they were just there 1 night. So funny!

We walked for maybe 45 minutes total. It was hot enough that we were down to just t-shirts and still a bit warm.

Love how this path looks beneath the trees:

Ivan and I both decided we’d happily take this house. Loved the style and the grey color and the yard landscaping was beautiful. (Do 2 almost empty nesters need this great big house? No. But it was still fun to fantasize….😆)

One house had little rock quotes sprinkled along the path. I liked this one a lot:

Finally, we headed back. It was getting to be later in the afternoon and we still had a ~1 hour 15 minute drive.

On the way to the car:

And that’s all! We were on the road by about 3:15, home by 4:30. Said our big hellos to Charlie, unpacked, and then I made a grocery list and together Ivan and I ran to both Aldi and Woodman’s to restock our house with groceries.

We had the best time! And we were both amazed at how much we loved Lake Geneva- we were kicking ourselves for not going there sooner! We will definitely go back. 🙂

I’m so happy we had that time to reconnect and just relax and enjoy the beautiful surroundings. Everything felt so perfect! (Incredible weather never hurts.) It was really a dream fall getaway for us. 💕