2019 Mini-Vaca, Western Iowa, Part I - Gettin' There

So we've been kind of embarrassed by the fact that we've lived in Iowa for around 90 years combined and we've seen so little of our local State Parks, Nature Preserves and whatever else.  This lack of our observation of local beauty came about with the realization that we saw so VERY little of the are surrounding the "local" area of Tulsa Oklahoma while we lived there for 3 Freakin' YEARS!!!

So after the last two summers of visiting Hawaii and the New England area respectively, we decided that this year will be a few smaller/shorter/less expensive trips around Iowa (and 1 to Chicago earlier this year, which reminds me, I've posted nothing from that trip...) visiting state parks and other local interests.

We left the house shortly after 8am Saturday morning with Mom driving, dad riding shotgun and the boys in the back sporting various opinions.  Caleb was super excited because we were going to be hiking later in the day and Robby was highly disenfranchised that he was being forced to go almost exactly 12 hours after being home from camp.  Not a happy man...  he had set down with me the night before and recited a passionate plea of why he should be left behind (non of his reasons were to help take care of Grandpa, which would have been his best argument!) but I told him to can it, he's going and he may just as well as enjoy as much as he can.  He appeared dejected and headed back to his room where I could hear him telling his buddies that he was being forced against his will to go on this stupid trip.  LOL!!!

The disenfranchised Robert James at the Chuckwagon restaurant in Adair Iowa.  This is one of our favorite little restaurants after accidentally discovering it when Caleb and myself were headed to a 1-day adoption camp in Ashland, Nebraska and needed to find some supper.  As luck would have it, we pulled into the Chuckwagon and had some fantastic burgers.  Turns out that they won the best burger in Iowa contest the next year!

The Chinaman not wishing to be photographed...

It ain't much, but never had bad food or service in this building!

Robby was driving at this point (after breakfast) and he doesn't like the interstate (even more-so than his dad!) so I had him drive on the interstate from Adair over to hwy 173 to head North into Elk Horn, Iowa.  I love roads I've never been on so this figured into my decision of where to get off of the interstate.  This is heading into Elk Horn.

Rob drove to Portsmouth, IA where I took over driving until our first destination of the day, which I'll cover in the next post!