We spent a cozy three day holiday weekend in a yellow cottage overlooking frozen West Okoboji Lake, staying with friends. It was cold and snowy, glorious when the sun came out and the sky was blue. Fishing huts on the ice, a patch of snow cleared from the frozen lake for red-cheeked kids to skate, geese alighting, deer in the woods and the occasional cross country skier, snow shoer and ski-doo.
I’ve been to okoboji (part of the Iowa Great Lakes, a resort since the 1800s for visitors from Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota) in the summer, when it’s packed with partying boaters and swimmers, crowded bars and beaches and amusement rides. But never when it was so cold and quiet. 
My friend grew up here so she took me on a great driving tour through various beachside neighborhoods. We only went in one place, the very cool Fish House near Arnold’s park, a rustic shack on a floating barge (that in the summer sets off into the lake.) it was full of families in winter gear, some taking a break from ice skating, eating popcorn and drinking. Some fishing poles rested beside a rectangular fishing hole in the lake’s ice, with murky green water, in the middle of the shack near a wood burning stove. No masks worn except by us, despite a sign requiring them. Oh well.
Some highlights:
Gulf Point State Park (near our friend’s place) with a cool CCC stone lodge
Abbie Gardner Memorial and cabin; Pillsbury Point, O’Farrell Sisters (old cafe) near the Fish House; Omaha Beach, Pikes Point, bar near Pioneer Beach Resort on east okoboji Lake; hike at Kettleson Hogsback near Big Spirit Lake, consignment store in Spirit Lake.
Easy drive home from Burwell, Nebraska with a few stops, starting with Fort Hartsuff, an 1880’s U.S. Army calvary outpost fort from 1974 to 1881 on the edge of town. It’s a well-preserved state historical park on the edge of the windswept Sandhills but several buildings were closed due to Covid-19 precautions. Further east in Omaha, we found even more happening in the Blackstone District since we were last there in 2018 including a new attractive food hall, The Switch Beer & Food Hall, (a clean, ultra-modern space on bottom floor of a clean, ultra-modern new high-rise) which has several good dining options (complete with outdoor seating)! We opted for the well-reviewed Ansel’s Pastrami & Bagels where we had the famed pastrami sandwich (delicious but seemed more like brisket than pastrami) and bagel with dill cream cheese and lox. Bagels are good – heavier and chewier than I’m used to but that’s fine. Next time, I’ll try the Vietnamese Street Food option. Over the Iowa line in Council Bluffs, we stopped for some Jonathan apples at Dittmar’s Orchards, which was full of families picking apples and pumpkins. (We were the only ones wearing masks…)
We’ve cycled along the Des Moines River Trail from downtown at Mullets southeast to the Cownie Soccer fields but yesterday we discovered the trail has recently been extended about six more miles to Easter Lake and it’s a glorious ride that is surprisingly rural in parts (for a city trail). (Turns out this leg of the trail is named after an old friend and now city councilman Carl Voss!)
We passed a lush soybean field and rode through the woods along the river to Easter Park, which we’ve also spent little time at. The Park has a wonderful six-mile trail looping around it and through it with nice playgrounds, cool bridges (including a red covered bridge — shades of the Bridges of Madison County). We found a perfect picnic spot on one bring crossing the late — a stylish high-top circular table with two high-top metal seats, where we ate as a few canoeists paddle below us and some pimply teens goofed around and played Lynyrd Skynrd louder than we’d like but hey, it’s a public park.
There’s a very cool new protruding ramp known as “the EMC overlook” at MacRae Park on Des Moines’s south side offering dazzling views of downtown. We also took in some new views from the new Chris Coleman bridge in Gray’s Lake Park. Looking good Des Moines.
TakeBetsywithyou 