'The City Of Sculpture' Is A Charming Midwestern Escape With Scenic Wildlife And Peaceful Marsh Trails

On the surface, Waupun, Wisconsin looks like many other cute, quaint, small towns that you'd pass through while traveling to other, bigger places. Located 75 minutes northwest from Milwaukee, Waupun and its main street –– especially the short block from Mill Street to Fond du Lac Street –– is a particularly pretty stretch of shoulder-to-shoulder, two-story stone facades with a handful of businesses like a bar, a coffee shop, and more. As it leads to an abundance of marshlands beyond the town's borders, travelers might notice a curious abundance of outdoor statues – stylized, bespoke, and mostly bronze. That's because Waupun, the "City of Sculpture," has one of the largest numbers of outdoor sculptures in the U.S. per capita. 

Waupun's sculptures started with one man: Charles Shalter. A prominent businessman and entrepreneur, Salter dedicated eight sculptures to Waupun over his life, often featuring Native Americans or scenes from pioneer life. He commissioned many of these, like 1929's striking and sympathetic "The End of the Trail," which features a Native American man slumped over his horse. That sculpture and the evocative "Recording Angel" are on the National Register of Historic Places. Much more recently in 2024, five additional sculptures got added to the town in coordination with the non-profit, Create Waupun. That makes 13 statues total, which isn't a lot except when we consider Waupun's population of 10,700 – that's one statue per 823 people.

But far from being a mere hotspot for thoughtful, outdoors artistry, Waupun sits within close distance of quite a few parks and wildlife reserves of the flat and marshy variety, particularly Horicon Marsh and the Marsh Haven Nature Center. These parks and their tranquil, isolated trails, when combined with Waupun's in-town sightseeing and charming downtown, makes the "City of Sculpture" something of a Midwestern haven. 

Wisconsin is also full of natural beauty. The state is speckled with lakes and lined with rivers, and its Door Peninsula grants easy access to beaches and Lake Michigan. And while a riverside village like Thiensville sits along the Milwaukee River and has plenty of trails to hit, Waupun is unique for its proximity to a whole bunch of marshlands. Typically overlooked in favor of the staggering, awesome grandeur of mountains or the deep, dense coziness of forests, marshlands — with their waist-high reeds and flat, wide-open landscape — have a beauty all their own. Plus, wildlife are easy to spot, especially waterfowl like redhead ducks. So it is for the multitude of trails near Waupun.

The Marsh Haven Nature Center (a mere five-minute drive from Waupun) and huge, 33,000-acre Horicon National Wildlife Refuge (less than 15 minutes away) are your two big choices when looking for trails around Waupun. They both have similar, marshy terrain, wooden walkways that traverse watery, impassable sections, and loads of waterfowl and migratory birds. Trails are even named after the animals that you're likely to encounter there: the Egret Hiking Trail and Boardwalk, Red Fox Hiking Trail, and the Redhead Hiking Trail. These trails are mostly flat and super easy to navigate, make for a comfy walk rather than an arduous hike, have telescopes for animal watching, and are focused on conservation. While the Marsh Haven Nature Center has a very regular schedule (10 a.m. to 4 p.m. every day), the Horicon National Wildlife Refuge's closures depend on the season, as does road availability and visitor center hours.

Travelers to the "City of Sculpture" would be missing the town's chief claim to fame if they didn't tour its outdoors sculptures. For those who want to double-up on the walking and mix a marsh walk with a town walk, there's an app called Otocast that can guide you from sculpture to sculpture. In general, all 13 of the sculptures can either be seen directly on Main Street or a little ways down side streets. Even only the names of the sculptures exhibit their noble intentions, like "Who Sows Believes in God," "Morning of Life," and "Dawn of Day."

These sculptures have helped inspired a burgeoning arts community in Waupun. That community hinges on several hotspots, like the Waupun Fine Arts Gallery in the Waupun Public Library that showcases local talent, Imagine That! Art Studio, and the rentable auditorium in Waupun City Hall that the Waupun Community Players use for performances. Visitors can easily build these places into their itineraries to get the most out of the "City of Sculpture." 

And because any trip to Waupun — either on a marshy trail or admiring sculptures in town — eventually requires food and beverages, we'd be remiss to not remind the reader of Waupun's restaurant-and-bar-filled downtown stretch. The completely walkable Main Street includes the extremely homey and wooden interior of Wind and Unwind, a coffee shop, the excellent, homestyle diner fare of Mateo's Restaurant, Waupun's own Hoya Hop House Brewing, and much more. And if you want to add a Wisconsin sculpture tour of a totally different type to your itinerary, then Dr. Evermore's bizarre, quirky sculpture park made totally from scrap metal awaits less than 90 minutes away from town.