First time across the Plains

Six hours? It can be done, but in the same way a perfect game can be done in baseball. Doesn't make it at all likely it will happen. And no way traffic doesn't come into play, unless you're driving at 2 a.m.

If you're driving from the Twin Cities to Chicago, there's no reason to drive through Milwaukee, just keep going down I-90 via Rockford. Unless you want to see one of America's finest cities.  

And, yeah, I-94 is extraordinarily fucked up right now in downtown Milwaukee, but its worth dealing with to get to the shrine they built in my honor on the lakefront. I was born at a hospital on the lake and they built this water tower nearby to commemorate me. Milwaukee being intuitive as its always been, they built it 90 years in advance. Looks like a castle.

 

If you do go I-90, I'd take a short sidetrip to Devils Tower at Moorecroft/Sundance, and I'd  second Serve's recommendation to get off at Buffalo.

It's a nice drive up through Worland, Greybull, Cody, etc., with Ten Sleep as an added bonus (!). Just make sure you get gas in Gillette if you're running low because it's a long stretch of no gas to Buffalo.

The Buffalo Bill Cody museum in Cody is spendy, but worth seeing once.

 

Are Coors and Coors Light the only thing you can drink at Coors Field? If so, I would totally not go in protest.

 

Isn't this the one featured in About Schmidt? It's apparently some kind of Plains museum.

 

Drove I-29 once from Kansas City to Fargo. Gorgeous, gorgeous drive.

 

That would be like Busch Stadium only selling Busch and Busch Light.

 

Spend time in Denver, as much time as you want, because there is nothing else to do until you get to Minneapolis.
Coors Field is worth going to, just to see the park. If you are a beer guy, there are Coors and Budweiser brewery tours outside of Denver. If you are a Fat Tire guy, like myself, head up to Fort Collins and check out their brewery. You could actually do that on your way out of town and just keep heading north until you hit I80 at Cheyenne.
Nebraska is boring. Ridiculously boring. A couple weird Midwestern food things worth checking out: There is a fastfood joint, mostly in Nebraska, called Runza. A runza is interesting. Tasty, but interesting. Rough description: Think a calzone but with ground beef and onions and some cabbage and what not. Really good. In Iowa, a fastfood joint called Made-Rite (sp?). A Made-Rite is a loose-meat hamburger. Both will jump the cholestorel a bit.
Personally, I would go through Dyersville, IA on the way up to Minnesota. Take 35N out of Des Moines and when you hit highway 20, go east for about two hours. You can take 63 up from Waterloo to Minneapolis. But Dyersville is cool, just because I think every baseball fan should take a visit to Field of Dreams.

 

One other thing --
Watch the speed in Nebraska and Iowa. The troopers there see Nevada, Cali or Arizona plates and they think drug-runners. Seriously.

 

Go for the microbrews at Coors Field. A little pricier, but an in-state micro makes all the difference in the Mile High City. A lot of cool stuff in Denver is west of town - Morrison/Red Rocks, Bear Creek, Evergreen, etc. - and Sedalia has the Cherokee Ranch, which has a castle filled with 16th-century art.

Nebraska, as I've posted before, is a loooong drive. Bring lots of music because west of Hastings it's nothing but country and religious radio stations.

 

Echoing what Norman said ...

Sorry ... when I think major clusterfuck, I think of construction on Chicago Skyway or I-95 in Bridgeport/Fairfield, Conn.

Milwaukee's Marquette Interchange is hardly a clusterfuck right now.... If you're travel through Milwaukee late at night, yeah that's when you'll encounter problems since that's when they're doing most of the ramp/overpass work. But as a whole, it won't be much more noticable than rush hour traffic.

And yes .. 894 is the best way around if you want to avoid construction completely.