Backbone State Park

 There was a photo that always caught my eye when going through Mom and Dad's photos albums. It is a picture of Dad with his buddies hanging around the sign at Backbone State Park in Dundee, Iowa. It looks like they were having a lot of fun!  Since moving back to Iowa, I have always want to go there and a couple of weeks ago, we finally went.

Since Backbone is an hour north of Cedar Rapids, we spent the night at Molly and Adrien's and then headed up on a Saturday morning.  While driving, Molly was giving us information about the trails, how many miles they were and what  type of trail.  Most of the trails were short, like one mile but if we wanted to go around the lake, that would be the 6 mile trail.  We decided that would be the one to take.

We got to Dundee, Iowa and I mentioned my family lived there before I was born. Dad taught and probably coached there.  It's a very small town and as we got to the outskirts of town, ready to pull into the park entrance, we noticed a massive amount of flying moths or butterflies. We couldn't tell but they were everywhere! I was even running over them as I drove.

We pulled into a parking spot and prepared for our journey.  We first had to find the trail head and once we did, we were on our way.

The first thing we noticed were many worms hanging from the trees with a silky, spider web type string.  We didn't like this because we didn't want want worms on us and the web was very sticky and hard to get off.    If you look closely at the next photo, I tried to capture a picture of one hanging. 

We decided to put Adrien up front so he would run into them before we would. He decided swinging a stick in front of him would help out.

Since there were so many and he couldn't get all of them, I picked up a stick and swung as well.  I was right behind him.  I was glad I found my stick because it helped me on the very steep climbs.  We came to a part of the lake where the trees hung over it. We noticed a lot of huge trout swimming below the trees and then they would jump out and grab a worm hanging from the tree.  This was exciting to see these very large fish do this.  We also stopped every once in awhile to do a worm check.

This is just part of the lake we walked around, and what an adventure!

First we had the worm and web issue. We then had butterfly moth hijackers and they would stay on us forever.

The REAL adventure was when we got off the beaten path by mistake. Somewhere we made a wrong turn and the trail just ended in front of us.  We didn't want to go back because we had just done the most rigorous hike straight up and wanted to continue to go around the whole lake.  There wasn't anyone around,  just trees and foliage.

Molly got her phone out and found that we were extremely close to a campground so we decided to head that way. We  walked a little more and could see tents through the trees. We walked a little more and started walking through foliage that was up to our knees. The whole time I was worried about poison ivy, oak, or sumac.  Adrien ran into nettles and we were trying not to trip on the fallen trees we couldn't see under the greens.  The four of us finally fell out of the woods into the campground area with scratches and red patches all over us.  We found a spigot and washed up, especially our legs, and took a break. That exhausted us.   

We found the next trail head and headed out again.  

I think it took us 5 hours and when we got back to the car, we ate our picnic lunch at 4:30pm.  On the way home we talked about  going back some day and taking the same trail but go backwards to see where we messed up and got lost on the trail.  Luckily, we didn't have any poison ivy, oak, or sumac show up.

The sign has been replaced since my Dad's days here. I thought about him often that day.  Once that photo of my Dad is located, I will share.

Sisters

Whenever our age falls in the same decade, my sisters and I try to get together to celebrate.  When I turned 50 and Jo was about to turn 60, we decided to go to Cabo San Lucas.  What fun!  

Now I am 60 and Jo was about to turn 70 when she came to visit so we decided to find something to do here in Iowa.  We decided all four of us would meet at our cousin Sandy's house in Greeley, Iowa.  Before the luncheon, we visited Mom and Dad in the cemetery.

We tried to do a selfie but four of us wouldn't fit.  I found the timer on my phone and took these excellent photos.

Finally got one!!

Sherry brought us a car load of flowers so we left some for Mom and Dad and our grandparents. It was Memorial Day weekend so perfect timing!

We made it to Sandy's house and had a great lunch. It is always good to see our cousins.

We had planned in advance that we would recreate a photo from a very long time ago. Not sure what year this is but don't you think we look so cute?

Sandy took the photo and we had so much fun doing this.  We took things off her wall and rearraigned some furniture. It took several takes to get our heads in the right position.  

Here is how it turned out.

After all of that fun we headed home. Actually Sherry and Mary headed home while Jo and I headed to Molly's house in Cedar Rapids.  We were a couple miles down the road when Sherry texted Jo that said "Help! Flat tire!"   I turned the car around and headed back to find them.  Jo texted back and called but Sherry wasn't answering.  We were a little worried but when we pulled up, we saw the cute guy helping her out.

We scolded Sherry for not having her phone on her after that text.  She said when he stopped to help she just threw her phone in the car and started unloading the trunk.

Sherry made it to Dubuque to drop Mary off at her car and then on to her home. Thank goodness.  It was a stressful drive on the small donut tire.  

I have to mention that Jo and I hit the jackpot when the thrift store had 50 percent off everything. We went two days in a row. Jo and Gary were hoping to head home with an empty truck but they didn't.

It was sad to see them go. I can't wait to have them come back to visit!