This 10,000 square mile valley where glaciers turned away and rivers carved 600 foot bluffs 60 miles from Madison

Morning mist rises from the Kickapoo River, revealing limestone bluffs that glaciers never touched. While ice sheets flattened the surrounding Midwest 10,000 years ago, this 10,000-square-mile region escaped their reach. The Driftless Area stands as Wisconsin’s geological anomaly, where ancient river valleys carve through 500-million-year-old bedrock just 60 miles from Madison. Here, 150,000 residents preserve farming heritage dating to the 1820s in a landscape that defies every Midwest stereotype.

The valley system glaciers couldn’t flatten

The name tells the story: “driftless” refers to the absence of glacial drift, the rock debris ice sheets leave behind. During the Late Wisconsin Glaciation 30,000 years ago, ice flowed around this southwestern Wisconsin region, deflected by highlands to the north...

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