Next stop Saylorville and Amana Colonies

We arrived into Saylorville Recreation area, near Polk City, Iowa on Monday, September 15 and stayed til Sept 22.  Longest stopping point so far this trip.  We enjoyed meeting John in downtown DesMoines for lunch.  We viewed the sculpture gardens in downtown DesMoines and then drove out to Winterset, Iowa, the birthplace of John Wayne.

John Wayne's birthplace:

Back of a Van they had at his birthplace. 

We carry a lot of "stuff" with us but wood
is not one of the items so we enjoy our
propane fire pit.  

  We filled in our spare time in between visits with bicycle rides and a motorcycle ride around the area.  We rode bicycles one day about 6 miles and the next time 9 miles - trying to build up momentum so when we get back into Portland we can ride with the great nieces and nephews and actually be able to keep up with them.

Can't really see them, but these are all house boats in Saylorville.  

On Saturday John, Kathy, Nanci and Katie all joined us in Saylorville for a nice get together and barbecue.  John, Nanci and I worked together in CA&P in the Pacific Northwest, until they left in November of 1998,  they were both supervisors working with me and then off to Iowa to pursue State Farm agency careers.
































We then moved onto the Amana Colonies near Iowa City on Tuesday, Sept 22 through Sept. 29.  On Wednesday we went to the Visitor Center to do a walking tour of Amana, but it was moved to Friday, so we took ourselves on a walking tour.  Turned out great, we hit all the same areas and was able to take our time.

Amana General Store

Peanut Pumpkins

Largest Rocking Chair in Iowa 

Amana Community Church Museum

Our campsite in Amana RV - they gave us two sites
to accommodate our length.

On Thursday, we travelled to West Branch and attended the Herbert Hoover library and museums and again had a great history lesson.  Do you remember what Hoover's greatest accomplishments were?  You'll have to look it up on the web, but we were quite impressed with his many humanitarian accomplishments and the way he helped standardize commerce.

Herbert Hoover's home where he was born - didn't know they
had trundle beds during this timeframe.

On Friday, we went into Iowa City and had lunch with Nanci, who has had her State Farm agency for 14 years now.  We saw her office and enjoyed lunch in downtown Iowa City with her and Katie.  We also found a Costco to do our shopping and saw our first inside parking area for Costco - Also, enjoyed the gas price of $2.98 a gallon.




Saturday, we visited some of the additional Amana colony sites and then went down to Kalona to visit the Amish and Mennonite community.  We attended their fall festival, saw some beautiful quilts, beautiful made Amish furniture, and historical items and then drove out through the Amish community, seeing the horse and buggy carts and someone in the field working with a team of horses.  Did not take pictures as we wanted to respect their privacy - but was very tempted!!!

Monday morning, Sept. 29 we were off to Bloomington, Illinois.