The Friends of Lapham Peak describe their September gathering as "a fun night to get together and make friends." That's Women and Wine in the Woods, now heading into its third year at the park most Delafield residents already treat as a backyard. The wine night, like almost everything else on the group's fall calendar, also helps fund work at the park.
Lapham Peak is a state forest, which means the Wisconsin DNR manages the land, but a nonprofit called Friends of Lapham Peak, founded in 1989, covers a lot of what the DNR's budget doesn't reach: prairie burns, trail upkeep, snowmaking equipment, and this year, a new pier. Four events between September and late October fund that work, and if you live close enough to hike here on a regular Tuesday, it's worth knowing how those events and volunteer efforts support the park.
Four Dates, One Ledger
The group's own site lays out its mission plainly: sponsor and run events, raise money for projects, and support the DNR staff who maintain the property. This fall, that mission shows up as four separate gatherings that all feed the same account.
- Women and Wine in the Woods – a social evening now in its third year, ticket revenue included
- Colorama Run/Walk – the marquee fundraiser, held Saturday, October 3
- Fright Hike – a Halloween-season family event that runs on volunteer setup, staffing, and teardown
- Work Morning – a volunteer day for Butterfly Garden cleanup and trail maintenance, lunch provided
Last year, Fright Hike ran October 17 and 18, and Work Morning followed on October 25. The group's September 2026 newsletter confirms both events are back this fall, though exact dates weren't finalized in that update. What is confirmed is the annual meeting in November, when the Friends close the books on the season and decide what the money paid for.
What This Year's Fundraising Supports
For most of the calendar, that money goes toward things you'd never notice unless you were looking. Prairie restoration. Ski trail grooming. The kind of maintenance that keeps a 17-mile trail network from quietly falling apart.
This year is different. In April, the Friends announced a project to replace the aging fishing pier at Lupo Pond with a new one built to ADA and ABA accessibility standards, placed on the pond's south side and connected by a sidewalk to Lapham Lodge. It's the first time in a while that the fall fundraising season has a single, visible, walkable result attached to it. Register for Colorama or buy a raffle ticket at Women and Wine in the Woods this year, and there's a decent chance you're funding a pier you'll walk your kids out to next spring.
The park office sells merchandise year-round toward the same goal. T-shirts, caps, hoodies, and prairie seed packets, all with proceeds going back into Friends of Lapham Peak projects. It's a small detail, but it means the donation box isn't limited to race weekend. It's open every time you park at the tower lot.
Race Day Uses Two Trails. The Park Has Six.
Colorama itself is a good window into how the park is actually laid out. The 5K tours the middle level of the forest, the 10K follows the outer perimeter trail, and a free Smokey Bear Fun Run circles the pond at Homestead Hollow for kids. Walkers get a paved, accessible route that passes both the Butterfly Garden and the Hausmann Nature Center on the way back. Registration and packet pickup happen at Trecker Lodge, near Homestead Hollow, not to be confused with Lapham Lodge on the other side of the property.
That's two courses out of a trail system that runs more than 17 miles when you count every loop. The rest of it is there for the other 364 days of the year, color-coded by difficulty:
| Trail | Color | Difficulty | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| Meadow Trail | Green | Easy | Lighted, used for night skiing |
| Kame Terrace | Purple | Easy | 2.0 miles |
| Kettle View | Blue | Intermediate | 5.8 miles |
| Moraine Ridge | Black | Advanced | 7.0 miles |
Separate from the color system, there's a paved loop built for wheelchairs and strollers that starts at Homestead Hollow and winds through prairie and wooded habitat, roughly 1.8 miles with connecting trails that extend it further for anyone who wants a longer walk. And running through the middle of all of it is a four-mile stretch of the Ice Age National Scenic Trail, one of only eight National Scenic Trails in the country and the only one contained entirely within a single state. At Lapham Peak, it enters near Cushing Park Road on the north end and exits south toward the Glacial Drumlin State Trail, a working piece of a route meant to trace the edge of the last glacier across Wisconsin.
Most people who hike here regularly know one or two of these trails by feel. Fewer could tell you there are four named routes plus the accessible loop plus the Ice Age segment, all overlapping on the same 17 miles.
The Volunteers Behind the Trail Report
None of this runs itself. In July, the Friends of Lapham Peak held a small ceremony recognizing Anne Riendl for her years chairing the group's Snowmaking Committee, as she passed leadership of that committee to Jim Marschalek. It's a minor detail in a newsletter, but it's the kind of detail that explains why the fall fundraising matters in the first place. The snowmaking equipment that turns the Meadow Trail into a lit Nordic ski loop in January doesn't maintain itself, and neither does the person who runs that committee. Someone has to take over the job, and this year, someone did.
That same volunteer culture shows up earlier in the year too. In June, the Lapham Peak Ski Club brought Olympic silver medalist Gus Schumacher back for a rollerski clinic with the local skiing community, a reminder that this park's reach extends well past its own boundary lines.
One Thing That Doesn't Change
Through all of this, the 45-foot observation tower stays put. It sits atop the highest point in Waukesha County, 1,233 feet above sea level, and it's the one fixed reference point in a park that otherwise reshuffles its calendar every season. Skiers climb it in January. Colorama walkers climb it in October, between the Butterfly Garden and Hausmann Nature Center. The view doesn't change. Everything below it does.
If you've lived near Lapham Peak long enough to have a favorite trail, the tower is probably part of why. It's also worth knowing that the fall calendar underway around it helps support the trails you'll walk in March and the pier you'll fish from next spring. Registration for Colorama stays at its early rate through September 18, if that timing matters to you.
Living near a park like this is one of the reasons people put down roots in Delafield in the first place, and understanding how a place like Lapham Peak actually runs is part of understanding the town around it. If you're thinking about your next move in this area, or helping someone else think about theirs, Head Over Heels For Homes is a good place to start that conversation. Schedule a consultation whenever you're ready.
