Frogley Summer Tour - Day 5

Day 5: Des Moines, IA to Davenport, IA

Today was a bit off schedule. Dave’s phone died in the middle of the night, so his alarm didn’t go off at all. Mine went off an hour late, and though everyone was grateful for the extra sleep, it delayed quite a bit overall. We got half of the kids up and dressed, then Dave took the half that were ready down to the hotel breakfast while I got the other half ready and packed up most of our room. Then I took the other half to breakfast, while Dave and his half loaded the van. We ended up leaving the hotel around 9am, a full hour behind schedule.

We had a beautiful drive (with one bathroom/gas stop, and then a second bathroom stop) through north-eastern Iowa. Gorgeous rolling hills and very green fields everywhere we looked. We also drove through countless adorable little towns.

We eventually made our way to Effigy Mounds National Monument, just north of Marquette, IA, right on the Mississippi river. We looked around the museum and gift shop there, then took a 2 mile hike to the top of a bluff and back down to see some actual effigy mounds. The hike was much more strenuous than Dave and I remembered (it’s been 13 years since we did it), but the kids did fabulous… it was the adults who had a hard time keeping up.

Unfortunately, the hike took longer than we had anticipated, and we fell further behind schedule. By the time we got back in the car and back on the road it was nearly 4pm… the time we were supposed to be leaving Field of Dreams, which was still an hour south of us.

The drive to Dyersville was uneventful, but quietly stressful on my part as I struggled to both stay awake (Dave was driving) and give Dave directions for the back country roads we were traveling, and also lamenting on how late we were.

By the time we got to Field of Dreams, we knew we didn’t have long to stay. We left the gloves and ball we had brought in the car, let the kids run the bases and also to the cornfield outfield, and took a quick picture of our family by second base, then loaded back in the van to head back to Davenport.

We arrived in Quad Cities again around 7pm. We made a quick stop to the Kalls’ house and started a load of laundry, then met the Kalls and some of their visiting family members at Happy Joes/Jungle Bungle for dinner. We had a great time there letting the kids run around and burn off some energy. But as we started dinner there 2 ½ hours later than we planned, it started getting dark quickly.

At 9pm we loaded the van again, and went to see the last few things on our list of Dave’s Memories. The remaining items were all in Bettendorf, and it was sadly quite dark by the time we got to any of them. But we did manage to get the pictures we wanted. Then, instead of going into Whitey’s for ice cream, we stopped at HyVee and bought a small variety of Whitey’s ice cream flavors and took them back to the Kalls’ house to eat.

Pleasant Valley High School

Plum Tree Lane House (where Kathryn spent her very first Christmas)

Dawn's Parents' House

Chung Kim's Black Belt Academy

Now it’s nearly midnight, everyone is in bed and asleep, but I am still up writing this, and waiting for more loads of laundry. We need everything washed/dried/folded/rolled/loaded before morning so we can get an early start tomorrow. I hope we’ll be able to get going on time. If we don’t, we’re going to be pulling into our cabin in Rochester VERY late tomorrow night, which will throw off the whole next day.