Waterloo to Fort Dodge

 Slept pretty good last night even though not impressed by the hotel! Didn't even check out the breakfast, Kurt wanted to go out. There was a Perkins across the parking lot so walked over. 

Packed up and headed to John Deere Museum, just a couple miles from the hotel. I really enjoyed reading the history of the company. Did you know the president of the company did not want to expand into tractors? (he didn't) Can you imagine John Deere with no tractors? (I cannot!) Do you even know what products they made before tractors? (John Deere was actually a blacksmith and it all started with a self-scouring plow).





After the museum we were on the road for Fort Dodge, about two hours away. Got to town and had some Arby's for lunch then made our way to Mike & Rita's house. Chatted for a bit and I left the boys to enjoy some guy time and went to check into the hotel. Unpacked the car all by myself (yes, I cheated and used the luggage rack) and was going to take a little snooze. Instead I saw Iron Claw had just started and I got a little involved, so ended up watching a movie instead even though I missed the beginning and the ending. Will have to find that one on video!
Kurt and Mike picked me up at the hotel and we met Rita at ShinyTop Brewing for a beverage and little bite to eat. I wasn't super hungry so just had pretzel sticks and Queso - they were delicious! Kurt had a personal pizza which was very good too (I had to sample a bite). Mike dropped us off at the hotel for the car and headed out to their place for a bit. Just talked and caught up for a couple hours. Back to hotel around 10:00 and straight to bed. Vacation is catching up with me. Ready for my own bed tomorrow!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I hate American Airlines

Image
  Chase graduates A school Friday, July 25 so of course I am headed back to Charleston. Short solo trip as he gets to come home after graduation. He said he would prefer us to take time off when he is home so that is what Kurt is doing.  Flew out to Sioux Falls on Wednesday night, left early to give myself a little buffer in case there were any flight issues. Thankfully I did!!! Knew it was a tight layover in Chicago but unfortunately that was the only option that worked so went for it. Flight out of Sioux Falls was delayed... I understand to a point, but the frustrating part is they will never come out and say delayed and give you an estimate of how long. Five minutes before our scheduled departure they were showing on time and our plane wasn't even at the gate... Anyways, get to Chicago and missed my connection. They had booked me for a flight the next morning through Charlotte. They made me gate check my bag in Sioux Falls so long night in the Chicago airport with no bag. O...
Read more

Alligators and Houses

Image
When I asked Chase what he would like to do in Charleston other than the USS Yorktown he picked Cypress Gardens. So we did Cypress Gardens this morning. The main draw of Cypress Gardens is the swamp boat tour. You can either row your own boat through the swamp or do a guided tour for $5. I had read you need to get there early as both are subject to availability, so we planned to get there right at 9am when they opened. We arrived right at 9 am with maybe 5 other cars. Oh well, better than lines of people! We decided to go with the guided tour as we figured they could point out alligators and points of interest and added bonus we wouldn't get lost in the swamps of South Carolina. Ends up it is a man-made swamp so really no way to get lost and the alligators we saw were pretty obvious. We basically ended up paying extra for some young guy to row us and a bunch of old people through the swamp. We had to laugh at ourselves. Our tour guide did point out a couple of interesting tidbits a...
Read more

Charleston Day Two

Image
Good sleep last night!  Packed up and checked out of the hotel this morning. Stopped at the gas station for a couple donuts and headed out for the day. First stop of the day was the Angel Oak. As usual Kurt set the GPS to avoid highways so interesting drive. Angel Oak is a live oak thought to be 300 to 400 year old. It is 65 feet high and circumference of the trunk is 25.5 feet. Area of shade is 17,000 sq feet. It's largest limb circumference is 11.25 feet and length of 89 feet. They had large wooden posts helping to hold up the limbs. Many of the limbs are actually hollow. It was beautiful!!!  Next stop was Charleston Tea Garden. Out the boonies but another neat stop. The have a cute little gift shop with different hot and cold teas you can sample. We started with a video factory tour on the processing of the tea leaves. They tour was just three different video screens you watched as you went along the windows looking into the factory. Unfortunately, they will not start harve...
Read more