9/1/23 - 9/3: Bedmiji, Minnesota
Our tour started with a bus trip into Bedmiji town to see the long-standing woolen factory and get a group photo at the gigantic statues of Paul Bunyan and his oxen, Babe. Needless to say that Jeffrey and I didn't need any woolen wear since we generally spend our time in warm climates. Next up was visiting the headwaters of the Mississippi River at Itasca State Park. As is customary, we all shucked our shoes and had a nice wade in the shallow cool waters.
After a filling box lunch we then boarded the Chester Charles III for a lovely cruise on Lake Itasca. This boat was constructed in the late 1940s and had several jobs elsewhere prior to getting to it's current role.
9/4 - 9/7: Minneapolis, Minnesota
Getting on a tour bus the next morning for our first full day here, we spent the morning visiting Minnehaha Falls Park and St. Paul's Cathedral. Both were 'self guided" but interesting. The falls (which feed into the Mississippi River) didn't have much water to show off due to the drought, so it was more of a "Minnehaha trickle". Apparently it was also slow when President Johnson visited back in the mid-60s. They actually dammed the stream up-river in order to release it that day and have a decent fall flow during his visit. They also opened numerous fire hydrants nearby to contribute a little more water! The cathedral was grand and lovely and truly amazing in its size, craftsmanship, and history.
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| Minnehaha Falls |
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| St. Paul's Cathedral |
After lunch downtown on our own, we headed to tour the Wabasha street caves. These caves were originally escavated in the early 1900s and were initially used as a mushroom farm. Regardless of the temperature outside, they remain at a chilly 55 degrees and have to be heated to be comfortable. It has since been many other things, most famously a speakeasy visited by many gangsters. It is still actively used today for private functions and as a weekly social dance hall and bar. We ended the day with a guide on the bus showing us around the twin cities and sharing their fascinating gangster history.
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| Outside of the Wabasha Caves |
It was during this day that Maren discovered one of the cameras on her cellphone (the most used one) was not auto-focusing properly. We bopped over to the local Verizon store after getting back to the campground hoping to get it fixed and instead walked out 90 minutes later with new phones -- both of us! The bad news is they weren't free but the good news is our pictures for the rest of the trip should be fantastic!
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| First picture on new cellphone -- lights from the nearby casino |
New cameras (I mean cellphones) in hand, we started the next day on a Mississippi River lunch cruise. It was an appetizer of watermelon followed by hearty meal of BBQ chicken, pulled pork, cornbread, roll, and potato salad, with cookies for dessert. Jeffrey was in heaven and I was thrilled to get his serving of bread and butter pickles. We passed several interesting bridges and saw four bald eagles flying along the riverside.
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| Our riverboat lunch cruise vessel |
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| Lovely view from the boat |
The afternoon was spent getting a collection of specialized tours in the old St. Paul court house, known today as the Landmark Center. It houses a number of historical and artistic collections, including glorious wood turning projects and hundreds of years of keyboard instruments -- from harpsicords to electronic pianos. I was especially excited when a fellow traveler pointed me to a hat in the giftshop that showed giraffe! Out came the credit card!
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| Interior atrium of the Landmark Center |
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| Lovely large wood turned bowl |
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| Wood bowl with intricate wood carvings |
9/8: Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin
Our next driving day took us east back to the Great River Road following the Mississippi's path. It gave us some lovely views of the now-much-wider river. Along the route was a visit to the National Eagle Center where we were able to meet several bald eagles, all of whom have injuries that prevent them from surviving in the wild. We also enjoyed a private education session and another close eagle encounter before reboarding our rigs to continue to our campground-for-1-night just south of Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. It was a long day on small bumpy roads (with ugly construction areas) so we looked forward to a homemade dinner provided by our tour leaders.
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| Jeffrey at #4 Lock and Dam along the river in Alma |
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| The ambassador bald eagle we got to meet up close |
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| Showing us part of his wing span |
9/9 - 9/12: Davenport, Iowa
We've decided that this particular trip -- like the one we did in 2021 that followed Lewis & Clark's expedition -- is as much about the journey as it is the destination. Our driver's manual with turn by turn instructions has been pages and pages long each day as it tries to keep us on the officially marked "Great River Road". Our trip to Davenport today was the same multi-page setup with numerous detours texted to us by our leaders as they encountered them ahead of "the pack".
Today also had an enroute stop at the National Mississippi River Museum & Aquarium but, being a busy Saturday with events going on, it was especially challenging for our leaders to get us all squeezed into the available parking areas as we arrived. Given how much we like most museums, we took our time viewing the extremely interesting exhibits, eating at the cafe, and browsing the gift shops. New Tshirt for Jeffrey in hand, we were one of the last of the group to return to our rig but had less than 90 miles left to drive to get to the new campground.
As we got set up to leave, we first noticed that it was taking a little longer to "air up" on our airbags to our normal ride height. Turning off Max so we could hook up the car to be towed, we heard a continuous loud air hiss from near the back axel and Max began to sink back down. A frantic call to a nearby Freightliner truck service center discovered that they closed for the weekend in less than an hour. With the engine running we were able to maintain most of our air pressure and managed to drive the five miles to the service center without issue. The issue was a good sized leak in one of our rear air bags and, though they were willing to work late to install a new one 😀 they didn't have ours in stock ☹️. A new one would arrive Tuesday morning and Max couldn't go anywhere until then, but they thankfully had an electric hookup for him.
We packed what we needed for 2 nights in a hotel and drove the car to Davenport so we can be near our fellow travelers and participate in the tour activities that are scheduled over the next few days. Though we hate having an issue, the timing really was fortunate as the group doesn't move on until next Wednesday. We managed to get to the evening's dinner cruise just in time!
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| Hole in the $375 airbag |
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| Lovely view of downtown from our boat |
After a nice breakfast at the Best Western, we drive the car and park it at the group's campground and jump on the bus with everyone. Our day included a visit to Herbert Hoover's Presidential museum followed by the "Iowa 80 - The World's Largest Truck Stop" and the Iowa 80 Trucking Museum. We capped the day with an early private supper at the Circa Playhouse followed by two hours of outstanding dueling piano playing. I found it humorous that they looked at the silver hair in our group and started playing Sinatra-era music, but once we all started making requests it was Billy Joel, Elton John, and Tina Turner!
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| Truck Museum |
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| Dueling Pianos |
One more night in the hotel for us and we checked out and drove to Amana Colonies where we jumped on the bus filled with our group to get a guided tour. Established in 1855, by 1880 this was the largest communal society in America and it supported it's members in all aspects until 1932 when it transitioned to the Amana Society. Instead of everything being owned by the church, it's members now had greater opportunities, could earn wages, and even own homes. It has been well preserved and still farms, raises cattle, and supports numerous businesses, including Amana Appliances, now owned by Whirlpool.
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| Lovely Amana colony home |
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| Local shop |
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| Furniture shop |
We were served a yummy family style lunch at the The Ronnenburg restaurant and then Jeffrey and I split off from the group to drive back to Max for the night. On the way we stopped in Cedar Rapids and had a nice visit with RV friends, Dawn and Jeff Marlin at their "Iowa" home. We'll see them again in Florida this winter when they transition to their RV, currently parked near Gainesville.
By early afternoon the next day we had two new rear airbags and we're on our way to spend the last night with the group in Davenport, Iowa. Thankfully that was a mostly free day with no organized activities so we didn't miss any big events of the tour.
9/13 - 9/14: Hannibal, Missouri
In the morning we followed the prescribed driving path down the Mississippi River road to Hannibal, Missouri, most famously known as the birthplace of Mark Twain. Next to the campground is Mark Twain's cave. He spent a lot of time exploring this cave system as a child and it was featured in some of the stories he wrote about Tom Sawyer.
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| Mark Twain cave system -- our tour followed the red line |
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| Entering the cave |
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| Hearing stories about the cave as our guide led us through it |
The next day we did tours of the Mark Twain Interpretive Center, his museum, his boyhood home, the "Huckleberry Finn House" (a reconstruction of his friend, Thomas Blankenship's house), his father's law office, and the actual home of childhood friend Laura Hawkins (who was the inspiration for character Becky Thatcher). We had lunch at the Mark Twain Diner where we indulged in homemade rootbeer. Our final stop of the day was at Mark Twain's Winery where we enjoyed watching a Mark Twain impersonator tell a number of stories from Mark Twain's life.
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| Our impersonator |
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| Mark Twain's boyhood home |
Our next driving day was supposed to be to St. Charles Missouri which is right next to St Louis. We only got about 7 mi down the road before getting a low coolant alarm in Max and having to pull over. After 12 years of living full-time, we had our first experience calling our RV roadside assistance plan for help. Assuming we would need to be towed to a shop for some type of repair we waited patiently along with the "tail- gunner" couple of the tour until they were sure that we were going to be taken care of. We even had a local Hannibal police officer watching over us with lights on to ensure the very-little-traffic road we were on didn't pose any danger.
A tow truck finally showed up and the technician crawled under Max and saw that the problem was simply a coolant hose leak. He attempted a repair right there but the old clamp wouldn't hold sufficiently under pressure and we ended up driving to his shop where he was able to install a brand new hose and clamp. We were thrilled we didn't have to get towed as this is complicated for a long RV like ours and can be problematic if not done properly. We finally pulled into the new campground where the tour is staying for the next three days, just in time to join in the group potluck dinner. It was a long and stressful day and we were glad it was over!
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| The tow truck, us, and the police officer. Happy we didn't have to get towed! |
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This concludes Part 1 of our Mississippi River Road caravan, September 1 through 14, 2023. The story continues in Part 2 here: http://marenandjeffrey.blogspot.com/2023/09/part-2-mississippi-river-road-caravan.html
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