The Everest is centrally located in a lovely historical district. It's a big house -- a big front porch, a screen-in porch in back, and a comfortable dining/living room area for people to sit around in. But the real attraction for the visitors seems to be the kitchen. Either Lori or Dave seems to be there all the time to answer questions or just chat. Lori keeps the kitchen going with fresh coffee and fruit juices, biscuits and cookies. Breakfast is pretty darned elaborate. I felt badly that I couldn't eat more! Lori is a real chatterer, in a nice way -- she and Dave have lived in Wausau for ages (most of their lives?) and they seem to know everyone and everything. They were real sweeties, so kind and helpful.

The decor is a bit kitschy for me. So much stuff! In my room, I kept on losing track of my own stuff. But what a room! We had the basement 'suite,' with a queen size bed, a futon, and a single bed/couch. Tons of room, nice, nice bathroom, TV, gas fireplace. It was very cozy for such a large space. A small family would be completely comfortable here.

But the really fun thing about The Everest is that they seem to house all sorts of long-term visitors to Wausau. While we were there, we met two Russians, one a woman who was on a six week technical training visit to Wausau, and her Russian interpreter (shout out to Yuri! What a charming guy). We met the traveling nurse who visited every couple of weeks for his job; they have had artists stay there while working on a commission; other international students; and many other regular visitors. All of this makes The Everest very connected to Wausau. I enjoyed the town much more than I might have otherwise.

Lori reminds me of my ex-mother-in-law (which is a GOOD thing). Small town in all the best kinds of ways -- connected to her community, aware of the world, well-read, friendly.

I was in Wausau for the Wright and Like tour, which was wonderful, but other high points of our short trip (aside from long, chatty sessions at the kitchen table) were
1. the really lovely Art Museum, just a mile up the street from the Everest (walk it if you don't mind hills). What a great museum for a smallish town (83,000 in Wausau).
2. The river walk, which led me onto an island in the middle of the river (which they call a lake here, as it is spread out over the flat plain of Wausau). Don't miss the spot behind the Farmer's Market where there's stadium benches set up facing the river. Why? Look at the rows of boulders -- when the dam levels are adjusted, they hold whitewater competitions there!!!!
3. The restaurants!!!!!! We went to Lucci's Back When (not exactly the name) and The City Grill. One of our housemates (Bob) also went to Mina's (?) and raved about it. I'm from Chi-town. I'm used to good food, but I'm used to higher prices. Hey, Bob had a huge prime rib with all the trimmings for $14, with beautiful salads and beautifully steamed vegetables, and ... well, it was great quality food, well-presented. I had an ahi tuna salad, and the tun was done just right, slightly seared on the outside. They knew how to cook vegetables and they knew how to cook fish, so high praise in my book. There's a huge number of Italian restaurants in Wausau. Why? I don't know. I also loved the grill we went to, the former Green Mill across from the cemetary on Grand(? It was down the street from the Duey-Wright House). Great diner, the BEST tuna melt I've had in years.

Folks are friendly and helpful.

Sorry I missed: Rib Mountain. Perhaps another time.

In all, I recommend The Everest highly, and think Wausau is well worth the drive. Now, as my traveling companion pointed out, if they got some artisanal stores going (local arts for sale), Wausau would have all we needed for a girl's weekend out.