On the road again in Winterset, Iowa

We are so excited to be on the road again! We had lots of last minute chores to complete, getting the house ready to sit empty for the next two months. We must say that travel was easier when we didn't have a house and yard to worry about. But we were on the road before noon. We were very soon into Missouri, and two hours later we crossed the state line into Iowa--with freedom to flourish.

Our first Iowa stop was at the Maid-Rite store and cafe in Lamoni, Iowa. We were here to eat a maid-rite sandwich for lunch. It's a food made famous in Iowa, and we love trying the regional dishes around the country. A maid-rite is a loose meat sandwich. That means they brown ground beef with some seasonings and serve it on a bun. Not spectacular cuisine, but it was made famous here at the Maid-Rite Cafe.

More spectacular were the cinnamon rolls that can be purchased here. They were about the size of your face, and were still light and fluffy.

Our first day included a three-hour drive to our first campground, and we found a gem of a park in Winterset, Iowa.  We were glad that this park had electrical hook-ups, because it was 94 degrees inside the trailer when we got set up. We needed our air-conditioner, and we can't run it with just our solar power. The city campground had lost a few trees, but they have turned those losses into carved art throughout the park.

They also had an English hedge maze in the park adjacent to the campground.

We took several dead ends within the maze before we found the sun dial at the center.

While the hedges were amazing for someone shorter, Mark could cheat and peer over the maze. So he won the race to the exit.

Denisa is a fan of the flower gardens, and this public park also had a nice bloom of purple cone flowers . . .

and wildflowers. 

Winterset has a big public park, and a one-mile hike (or drive) takes visitors through the forest to Clark Tower. Denisa felt a little like Rapunzel, like she should let down her long hair from this stone tower window.

The native stone tower provides nice wondow views from the middle level . . .

and another set of steps provides even bigger sweeping views from the top of the turret.

Also within our park was this unusually large boulder with an unusually large inscription. We learned that it commemorates the discovery of a new kind of apple by a Quaker that moved here in 1856. Quite by accident, he propagated an unusually elongated apple with five bumps on the bottom that was so good it was named "Delicious." The Delicious became America's best-selling apple for over a century, and it started right here in Madison County, Iowa. In our lifetime we have eaten a lot of Delicious apples and now we know where they came from.

The other interesting part of our park is one of the famous Bridges of Madison County. The subject of a book and then a 1995 movie starring Clint Eastwood and Meryl Streep, these bridges are sprinkled around the county. But the easiest to access is the Cutler-Dona bridge. It was built in 1870, and moved to this park in 1970--just in time for the first-ever Covered Bridge Festival. They are expecting thousands of people in Winterset for the festival this fall.

The town of Winterset's favorite son, Marion Robert Morrison, was born here on May 26, 1907. Most of us know him by his Hollywood name--John Wayne. His birthplace museum is in downtown Winterset.

The sidewalk out front is lined with granite tiles with the names of the 142 movies in which he had leading roles.

Adjacent to the museum is the four-room house where John Wayne was born. We visited town in the evening, when everything was closed. But the grounds were very interesting for a visit. . . and free.

Speaking of free, on the corner of this block rests Madison County's "Freedom Rock." An Iowa artist started this project to paint a boulder in every county in the state to commemorate the veterans from that area. This one was unique because it included pictures of John Wayne in his roles in military movies, while John Wayne never served in the military himself. On the other side of the rock were pictures of Madison County veterans that were POW's.

It was a good first stop on this first day of a two-month trip that will include eight states, two countries, five great lakes, and all the Six Flags parks in the midwest. We were back to our trailer in time for a cotton candy pink sunset. Have we mentioned how good it is to be on the road again?!?

School's out for the summer!

After traveling full-time in our motor home for nine years, we've settled into our home near our oldest son's family. We're glad to see our two grandchildren often during the school year. But when school's out for the summer, we get to see them even more!

Our son works full-time, and our daughter-in-law works half-time. So we were officially half-time care-givers when school was out. That included transporting Carter to swim team practice three mornings each week, and going to her swim meets.

Sometimes, we enjoyed a picnic in the park after swim practice.

Since she had more time on her hands, Carter practiced the piano more. Denisa is her piano teacher, and we put together a fun group of songs for her to play and sing for an appreciative audience at her first recital. Gram refitted a black cocktail dress into a recital dress, and we made an edible keyboard dessert. That's two-layers of brownies framing a keyboard made of white and dark chocolate kit-kat bars.

Everyday at Gram and Grandude's includes an ice cream break.

We also did field trips and hikes. We couldn't take any pictures, but we especially enjoyed the tour at the Amazon Fulfillment Center. They showed us how they handled all those arbitrary items that we bought one day and they delivered the next. Also, our favorite hiking spot is just a few miles from our house, and we always find wildlife. This was a box turtle that immediately closed his box when we arrived.

We also learned about the foamy liquid found on some of the plants along the trail. That foam is left from the spittle bug that lays her eggs in the middle of that spit.

We play lots of games, and this summer brought some new ones to our game shelf--like Googley Eyes, Go to the Head of the Class, Don't Wake Daddy, and Don't Step on the Poop. 

This summer we also built a ninja course in our basement for this five-year-old. Eli is a rock climber, and he can crank through a series of swinging hand-over-hand bars . . .

and maneuver across an 8-foot I-beam like a ninja.

Many days, we would bike the five miles on the lovely trail that connects our house to their house.

We also bought season passes to Worlds of Fun--the local Six Flags amusement park.

Carter loves a good scrambler ride . . .

while five-year-old Eli loves every ride--the faster the better. His 42-inch-height means that he can't go on the biggest roller coasters, so he has incentive to eat good and grow taller by next summer.

We spend some time in Snoopy Land, where the cartoon characters give out hugs.

Every trip we have a tradition that includes rides on the carousel.

When it gets too hot for rides, we head to the adjacent Oceans of Fun. The two children absolutely love the wave pool!

Those smiles make staying close to home for part of the summer so much fun! But we have a trip planned that will take us on the road again for the hottest months of July and August. We're anxious to tell you all about it. We'll be visiting more of these Six Flag parks on our trip. While Six Flags recently sold Kansas City's Worlds of Fun, our season pass was purchased before that transaction. So we can use our pass to visit all the Six Flags parks in the midwest. That will take us on an interesting route home from our planned tour of the five great lakes. So stay tuned as we load up the trailer and head out for the Five Great Lakes/Six Flags tour of 2026!

Wandering through our Summer Holidays

After our trip to Arkansas, we spent much of our summer just wandering through the summer holidays. That would start with Mother's Day weekend, where we also celebrated our granddaughter's eighth birthday. She likes to fish, and the little pond next to her other grandparents' lake house provided fish that literally jumped on the hook as soon as it landed in the water. The picture below is a bit of a trick shot, holding the camera close and making that four-inch fish look surprisingly bigger. 

Carter caught over 25 of those whoppers in one setting.

Even though they were tiny, they were beautiful in their own fishy kind of way.

While the smarter family members agreed that the water was still too cold in May, Eli talked his parents into tubing with him.

Mark can't say "no" to his grandson, so he got on the tube as well. That's three generations of handsome Engelmen on that tube.

Or maybe we should point out that's three generations of crazy guys, with five-year-old Eli even standing up on the tube zipping around the lake?!?

For some reason, we didn't take a picture of the mothers on Mother's Day. But this seems a good time to include pictures of our Mothers. We spent a lot of time this spring moving Denisa's 96-year-old Mother  into an independent-living apartment that is close to Denisa's two sisters.

Mark's 98-year-old Mother is lucky that she lives close to many of her family members. We snapped this picture of her and two of her granddaughters that live close by. Incidentally, those grandaughters (our nieces) in the picture below are also grandmothers.

For the next summer holiday--Memorial Day--we took in some of the Kansas City area festivities. That would include riding the free downtown street cars. We like to park at the southern end of the line where the station was decorated with one of the Kansas City hearts that are scattered around the metro.

We exited the street car at the World War I Memorial station, where we joined thousands of our friends for the annual festivities that take place between the World War I Museum and Union Station.

We actually snagged a great uncrowded place in the shade with a good view for the U.S. Navy band performance, followed by a concert by the Kansas City Symphony. The very best seats on the closest lawn were reserved for military personnel.

Following the concert, the city treated us to a great fireworks display with Union Station in the foreground.

The street car ride afterwards was really crowded as thousands of people left that area at the same time.

Also on Memorial Day weekend, the Truman Presidential Library in Independence, Missouri, was hosting free admission and special events. Harry and Mark were hanging out together at the museum entrance.

Just like some other presidential libraries we have visited, this one included a recreation of the oval office as it looked during the Truman administration.

This presidential library and museum had recently reopened after a massive upgrade, and it was very well done. After two hours, we realized that we had only been through about a quarter of the exhibits. So we picked up the pace and read fewer details of the rest of the very interesting exhibits. Besides all the political turmoil and the background on the atomic bomb that ended World War II, we thought this car exhibit was interesting. The two new Chryslers that Harry and Bess bought in 1940 for a total of $2,703 were in mint condition.

After making the 30-mile trip to Independence, we decided to go for a hike as well. At the trailhead for the Lower Rock Ledge Loop, we saw a bag of free tick removal devices. Yikes! We also heard that Missouri gets the questionable title of being the state with the most ticks.

The wildflowers were still in bloom around the Little Blue River, and it was lovely in the shade. But on this 3.1-mile loop Mark did manage to pick up a tick hitchiker.

The only wildlife picture we have was of a very slow-moving snail making his way down the trail.

For the next summer holiday--Father's Day--we were blessed that both boys and families were with us for the weekend. The FIFA World Cup soccer games were also in town, with Kansas City hosting a game that day. The World War I Museum lawn was home to the FIFA Fan Fest, and we all had tickets to attend.

It was hot and crowded, and the lines were crazy long. Of course, this was a Saturday on a game day that hosted international soccer fans from all over the world. We didn't get into the line for most of the fan zone fun. There were literally hundreds of people in this shorter line that snaked back and forth just to get into the official FIFA store.

Our main reason to go into the store was the air-conditioning. We didn't buy the official soccer jerseys that were selling for $130 . . .

or the official soccer balls that were almost gone even though they were selling for $80.

A few weeks later it was the Fourth of July. We made a 1,000-mile circle drive to visit both of our Mothers. Then we stopped in Tulsa to spend time with our youngest son and his wife. They took us to an event at the Philbrook Mansion.

The Phillips family, who obviously had way too much money, built the mansion in 1926. Twenty years later, they donated the mansion and the beautiful gardens to be used as an art museum.

We wandered through the lovely gardens, and then ate dinner in the little cafe on the grounds.

While the mansion was filled with impressive pieces of art, the only picture we took was of this old leather suitcase. If you can read the fine print on the label, you will be surprised to see that it wasn't weathered leather at all. It was made of ceramic, and the four of us were amazed that the artist could reproduce such detail in that medium.

Ending with an old suitcase is appropriate, because we are packing even as this blog was typed. While we stayed around for many of the summer holidays we were anxious to be on the road again soon!