Category Archives: Iowa

July 17, 2010 · 5:27 pm

Shakespeare – Stratford (Ont), Ashland (OR), Des Moines

Shakespeare is here, there, everywhere and we’ve seen some of it – unfortunately not in Stratford, Ontario for about ten years. I used to go there a lot as a kid growing up in suburban Detroit and judging from a recent NYTimes review of “Stratford’s” latest season it’s as good as ever with Christopher Plummer, at age 80 no less, among the performers. In March we saw a very modern Hamlet at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland

And on Thursday,  we saw a lively production of “The Merry Wives of Windsor” (a rather silly play methinks) performed by the Repertory Theater of Iowa on the lovely grounds of  Salisbury House, an old English stone and brick mansion in, of all places,  Des Moines that provides a perfect backdrop for a Shakespearean play.  A local tycoon built Salisbury House in the 1920s,  inspired by a visit to the King’s House in Salisbury, England, which dates back to the 13th century according to Wikipedia. (And judging from the pix of Kings House, the Des Moines replica is pretty darned close.) Catch the “Merry Wives” while  (and if) you can – performances through this Sunday…

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July 11, 2010 · 2:39 pm

The High Trestle Trail – central Iowa

We have now ridden the entire 20 miles of the High Trestle trail – and it’s a nice addition to the trail offerings in this area. Earlier we did the Ankeny to Slater portion. Yesterday we did the Slater to just past Madrid bit – and it was a pleasant trail through wide open cornfields, with a few portions canopied by trees. Just past Madrid the smooth concrete trail goes native – becoming a bumpy gravel trail that leads for about a mile to the Des Moines River and the new High Trestle Trail bridge which is really great. It’s not done yet but we were surprised that we could walk – and even ride if we want – across it. We parked our bikes at the edge and walked onto the bridge to catch the glorious view of the broad river and tree-covered banks, with the occasional motorboat speeding underneath the bridge. A young couple rode their bikes east across the bridge and reported that there was a gravel trail/road on the other side, to date. How great it will be when the bridge opens and the trail going further west is paved!

We had a nice picnic in a pretty little town park in Madrid, near the public library. No one there, just us and the flies.

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July 10, 2010 · 3:52 pm

Iowa City restaurant recommendation

The new Motley Cow in Iowa City – in a modern building with a plate glass front – didn’t look as interesting as the old funky Motley Cow in Iowa City but we tried it last week for lunch (when Devotay, a favorite tapas place across the street, was, alas, closing by 2 p.m.  – close to when we arrived) and it was still very good. I had a beautifully cooked piece of salmon (moist on the inside but not raw, crisp on the outside but not dry) atop a bed of spring greens with a light cumin-buttermilk dressing and capers. My daughter’s dish escapes me but was good too. So thumbs up.

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June 15, 2010 · 10:40 pm

A review: the Megabus from Chicago to Des Moines

I planned to blog from the road yesterday – specifically while cruising along Interstate 80 from Chicago to Des Moines in the Megabus but alas, the bus’s much-ballyhooed free WiFi was on the blink.  The driver didn’t know why but said this happens occasionally. Otherwise,  the bus ride was just fine – and for the $10 fare, better than fine. (Some people paid as little as $1 for the ride, a few others got two tix for $8 total. Fare comparisons dominated the chitchat amongst passengers. )

The bus departed on time (5 p.m.) from Chicago at the crowded Megabus stop just south of Union Station and Jackson Street, on Canal Street – and it arrived in Des Moines about 35 minutes late, which was no big deal. The bus was clean, the seats comfortable, the air not too cold or  too hot. The driver was courteous and informative, taking the time to fill us in on bits and bobs, like the one scheduled pit-stop at a small gas station on I-80 near Davenport.

A few minor quibbles, some beyond Megabus’s control, that  have more to do with the nature of cheap bus transportation in general.  The bus stop in Chicago was somewhat chaotic, with a large crowd fanning out across half a block as a succession of buses pulled up – one bus going to St. Louis, another to somewhere-ville Ohio, another to Ann Arbor/Detroit and my bus to Iowa City/Des Moines.  As one of the older passengers correctly noted, this open air bazaar – with no visible crowd control and no benches to sit on or lines to stand in – is relatively OK in pleasant weather, which we had yesterday early evening.  But it might not be so OK when it’s raining or snowing or bitter cold.

Many passengers, as expected, were young people in their late teens and 20s  some tattooed and pierced, some black-clad Goths with dusty white faces, two chic geeks, some inner city kids wearing droopy pants.  Great people watching and reminded me of my lost-youth, riding the Magic Bus in Europe.

But on my bus there was also  a large multi-generation Asian family with a pushy patriarch, a Mennonite woman, some middle-aged couples, a few moms with kids.  I worried at first when the watery-eyed man in front of me took a sip from a liquor bottle inside a brown paper bag but he was well-behaved throughout. So was the little girl who sat on the lap of the teen-ager  beside me. The rowdiest passengers were some  women in their mid-30s who laughed and talked loudly, as if they riding their very own party bus after hitting the bars on Division Street (which come to think of it was probably where they had been.)

There were other annoying sounds and smells but that’s to be expected: a rattle-and-squeak  from  somewhere in the back of the bus near the bathroom, pulsating iPod musak from somewhere in the bus’ mid-section (the Ipod must have been  cranked up to blow-your-eardrums-out volume), smells of fried chicken, McDonalds (from the pitstop in Davenport), a fully-loaded brat, and corned beef (my bad. I  brought the sandwich with me from a Chicago deli.)

Next time, I’ll remember to fire up my Kindle – or at least bring the cord so I can plug it in. (There was an outlet below my window but my cord was in my suitcase in the bowels of the bus.) And I’ll remember to leave my novel out of my suitcase. I’ll also remember to fire up my phone (which was also losing juice.) Thank God my iPod was still working.

All told, it’s great to have a viable and inexpensive new option for getting to Iowa City and Chicago from here.

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May 26, 2010 · 8:37 pm

Des Moines: one of “the 10 best cities for the next decade.”

Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine picked Des Moines as one of its “10 Best Cities for the Next Decade” and they asked me to write about it – and do a slide show of what life can be like here. So here it is my online slide show/video of my adopted hometown, where I’ve lived since 1990:

http://www.kiplinger.com/video/index.html?bcpid=35148674001&bclid=1571610693&bctid=87685942001

and here’s the story online: http://www.kiplinger.com/magazine/archives/10-best-cities-2010-for-the-next-decade.html?topic_id=40

for more specifics on Des Moines (we’re #7!) see: http://www.kiplinger.com/magazine/archives/best-cities-2010-des-moines-iowa.html

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May 22, 2010 · 12:15 am

Cedar Rapids sites

Horrors, almost forgot to blog today. Here’s a few more tourism sites on the mend in Cedar Rapids, almost two years after the devastating flood there: Theatre Cedar Rapid, a 1920’s treasure; and Ushers Ferry a historic village that recreates small town Iowa at the turn of the (20th) century. I remember my kids having a good time at this spot when they were little and I was dragging them all around Iowa while researching my travel book Fun with the Family in Iowa.

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May 19, 2010 · 1:45 pm

Dubuque, Iowa with kids: takemewithyou

My friend Jane is looking for some advice on entertaining two young kids during a possible trip to Dubuque so I’ve pulled out some old clips of mine – one from a NYTimes story in 2005 I wrote about Iowa’s undiscovered Mississippi River shore and another I wrote for the Minneapolis Star Tribune in 2003 about the then-new water park in Dubuque.  The National Mississippi River Museum has just added a new wing, I think, with new exhibits – although might not be the best for really young kids – but there are other things there that they’ll like – especially the aquarium. So I say, GO!

From my NYT story: (http://travel.nytimes.com/2005/08/19/travel/escapes/19road.html?pagewanted=print)

Stop in Dubuque at the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium, a Smithsonian affiliate that opened in 2003. Huge blue catfish, gar and paddlefish swim in a 30,000-gallon tank, a boardwalk goes through reclaimed wetlands inhabited by herons and bald eagles, and a model of the river at Dubuque shows the havoc caused by a 1965 flood.

Downtown, Dubuque feels like an old factory town, with Victorian mansions (several converted into inns), brick row houses flush to the street and many a corner tap and church. Don’t leave without riding the Fenelon Place Elevator, a funicular that makes a steep climb to a bluff top where Wisconsin and Illinois are visible across the river.

From Dubuque, Iowa: Riverfront water park is a scream

SApril 20, 2003

Even before my family entered the new resort hotel in Dubuque, Iowa, we heard muffled screams coming from a chute snaking out and then back into the building.

We were soon screaming, too.

Screaming — in delight or horror — while sliding through a dark, winding water chute is part of the fun at Iowa’s first themed indoor water park. Opened last December, the Grand Harbor Resort and Waterpark is the first tourist attraction resulting from a major redevelopment of Dubuque’s riverfront.

On a March weekend — during spring break for my children, L, 10 and N 11 — the resort was full, its 194 rooms packed with more than 700 guests. Most were like us, parents bunking with kids for a water-filled weekend.

About half the size of a football field, the 25,000-square foot water park has three main water areas — a shallow pool for young children, a deeper pool for older kids and a 4-story-high play structure resembling an old-fashioned steamboat (“The Huck Finn II”).

N, L and my husband, D went right to the big kids’ pool — and the water chute. Again and again, they whizzed down that dark chute on an inner tube, landing in a pool with a big splash. (Once was enough for me.) While N and D played water basketball, L climbed on giant plastic lily pads, and I happily drifted in an inner tube along a small “lazy river.”

We also enjoyed the Huck Finn II, which felt like a cross between a giant McDonald’s playland and the Titanic, posticeberg. A multilevel structure in ankle-deep water, the Huck leaked everywhere, with water spraying every which way.

Kids (and grownups) scurried up nets, climbed steps and slid down two curving open-air water slides. They turned valves, pulled pulleys and shot water cannons to release even more water (often onto unsuspecting people below.) Every 15 minutes, a steamboat bell clanged and an 800-gallon bucket atop the Huck tipped over, spilling water on people below.

The shallow pool was full of young children frolicking in vertical water sprays and sliding down a short, wide slide. Parents lounged in two warm whirlpools, watched kids from plastic tables and visited the snack bar.

The water park absorbed — and entertained — us all. We had plenty of elbow room. Lines for the water slide were short and moved swiftly. The place was clean and well-run, with lots of eagle-eyed lifeguards, water depth signs, inner tubes, balls and towels. The air wasn’t humid or reeking of chlorine. It wasn’t even noisy (despite the occasional scream).

Betsy Rubiner is the author of “Fun with the Family in Iowa,” to be published by Globe-Pequot Press in June.

If you want to venture beyond the water park, there are several other attractions in and around Dubuque:

• National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium: Scheduled to open in June, this museum will feature river wildlife from catfish and snapping turtles to alligators, otters and water moccasins, plus a working boat yard and replicas of barges, keelboats and steamboats. More information: 1-800-226-3369 or http://www.rivermuseum.com

• Spirit of Dubuque Sightseeing Cruises: This authentic paddle-wheel riverboat operates May through October from the port of Dubuque, offering one-hour narrated sightseeing cruises, plus dinner cruises. Reservations are a good idea. More information: 1-800-747-8093 or http://www.spiritofdubuque.com.

• Fenelon Place/Fourth Street Elevator: This one-of-a-kind outdoor elevator is billed as the world’s shortest, steepest scenic railway. A Dubuque banker built it in 1882 so he could quickly get from his house up on a bluff to his office downtown. It’s a quick, 263-foot ride with terrific river views from the top. More information: 1-563-582-9496.

Crystal Lake Cave: More than 40 feet underground, this is marketed as Iowa’s largest cave open to visitors (May through October.) During the 45-minute guided tour along well-lit passageways, you’ll see an underground lake and intricate formations (some resembling hollow soda straws or well-done bacon.) You may also spot rare cave crystals known as anthodites. For more information: 1-563-556-6451, http://www.crystallakecave.com.

What to know

• It’s a fact: Iowa’s oldest city, Dubuque, population 62,000, is midway through a major riverfront redevelopment to include a river walk (due to open mid-May) and conference/education center (due to open in November.)

• Getting there: Dubuque is about 280 miles from Minneapolis. The scenic route is to follow the Great River Road south, following the Mississippi all the way. Faster: Take Interstate Hwy. 35 south to Hwy. 20 east through Waterloo to Dubuque. To get to the resort, turn left on Locust St. (just before the Julian Dubuque Bridge) and right on 3rd St.

More information: Grand Harbor Resort and Waterpark, 1-866-690-4006 or http://www.grandharborresort.com.

Where to stay

The Grand Harbor Resort has 194 guest rooms including 31 suites. (Ask for one overlooking the Mississippi.) There is a restaurant, game arcade, “WaterSquirts” children’s activity club and, of course, the water park. Room rates include water-park admission (and sometimes breakfast.) Doubles range from $99 to $219; for a suite, from $139 to $329.

Where to eat

• For only $10 extra, our room came with breakfast at the resort’s restaurant, the River Walk, which was a great deal. We could have ordered off the menu but chose the buffet, which included a good omelet bar. The restaurant, also serving lunch and dinner, is open daily 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.

• We had a good dinner at the Blackwater Grill at the Bricktown Brewery, a lively family restaurant in a restored red brick building in Main Street’s Historic District. The long menu includes huge burgers, salads, steaks and fish. Open daily for lunch and dinner, it’s at 299 Main St.

• For terrific artisan breads and pastries, visit Cafe Manna Java, a coffee bar and bakery at 269 Main St.

• If you can’t bear to leave the water park, order a pizza delivery from the Shot Tower Inn, a popular place downtown at 390 Locust St. Telephone: 1-563-556-1061.

The water park

Hours: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday, until 11 p.m. on Friday, 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday and until 9 p.m. Sunday.

You can stay in the water park longer than in your hotel room. Hotel check-in is 4 p.m., but you can get into the water park at 2 p.m. (Our room was ready early.) Hotel checkout is 11 a.m., but you can stay at the water park until 1 p.m. There are bathrooms with lockers and showers next to the water park.

For kids: The WaterSquirts Kids Club, for children 12 and under, is a small room by the main entrance offering crafts, board games, movies, free arcade tokens and free T-shirts

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May 11, 2010 · 10:46 pm

FLWright in Mason City again

The FLWright house that  reopened recently in Mason City is not to be confused with the FLWright hotel – the last of the six hotels he designed that remains – that I gather is opening in about a year.  The restoration of the hotel – to be called the Historic Park Inn Hotel – has been in the works for 13 years, with three different owners, the most recent being a citizens group that bought the poor old place on ebay for $1. The hotel first opened in 1910. Wright reportedly visited the hotel construction site (and next to it a bank he designed) until a notorious escapade ended his visits – Wright took off for Europe with the wife of one of his clients. (See the novel “Loving Frank” for more details on that.)

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April 14, 2010 · 11:06 pm

New Iowa B&B? (or maybe just new to me)

The DM Register’s story on Iowa B&Bs today mentioned some I hadn’t heard of before. One in particular caught my eye because it’s in a town I  like to visit –  the pretty Northeast Iowa river town of McGregor. The place is Stauer House Bed & Breakfast.

In McGregor, we’ve had good luck with the Little Switzerland Inn.  Two summers ago, I stayed there with a friend from London and we got the   entire upper floor of the inn, complete with a full kitchen and balcony looking out on the Mississippi. In the past, we’ve rented the 1850’s cabin next to the Inn’s regular building, which is perfect for a family with kids – even if it’s a little strange being in a cabin smack dab on the busy Main Street. (The cabin was relocated, presumably from a more rural location where a cabin would more likely be built.)

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March 29, 2010 · 7:04 pm

agritourism – the latest

I first wrote an agritourism story for the NYTimes ten years ago (“Historic Hybrid in Iowa” published Nov. 26, 2000) – and even then it wasn’t all that new.  But now comes word, again from the NYTimes, that agritourism is alive and well (or “gaining ground from coast to coast”) My story years ago was about the Garst Farm in Coon Rapids, Iowa.  This was a real workaday farm  that takes overnight guests and offers activities like riding, fishing and hiking. It also has a distinguished history.  In 1958, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev visited as part of efforts to improve his country’s agriculture.

Now there are several websites where you can find farms to visit and even work on. See Worldwide Opportunities in Organic Farms (wwoofusa.org) and Ruralbounty.com, a national agritourism registry.

Interestingly, I looked up Garst Farm on Ruralbounty.com and found it’s now part of something called Whiterock Conservancy (see http://www.whiterockconservancy.org/accomodations.aspx)

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