Fort Dodge, Iowa

If you have been following us on the map, you can see that we are not following our 3-2 traveling rule! We are traveling much less than 200 miles a day and we are stopping around noon. When we left Prairie Flower Campground, Bob and I both had experience with Iowa's no-see'ums. And we can tell you these little critters are much more vicious than Florida no-see'ums. The Iowan version is almost black and it has a ferocious bite. One night while we were visiting with our friends, Ed and Doreen, I looked down after swatting around my head and found my shirt was covered with little black flecks! I could see'um! And even worse than that, I could feel where they had bitten my neck and my arms! I heard on the news a few nights later that these critters are also called pirate bugs. When the nights begin to chill and the insects are gone from the corn fields, the pirate bugs attack anything they can, especially humans! Okay, I have digressed from our travels.....

Our stop after Prairie Flower was Webster County Fairgrounds at Fort Dodge, Iowa. We just happened to arrive while a college rodeo was using the fairground arena. At the fairground we had our choice of a site with electric or a boondocking site. We chose the boondocking site. After we got set up, we hopped in the car and drove around town to pick up some geocaches.

 That evening, we went to the rodeo. We were a little late arriving and all the upper bleacher seats were taken so we had to sit on the first row. When you are watching a rodeo, that is not the best place to sit. For most of the events we watched the big screen television at the opposite end of the arena so we could get an idea of what was happening. The rodeo was exciting, especially the bronco riding and the bull riding. When it was over, many of the teams and their horses left the fairgrounds, but a few stayed until morning.

Saturday, we played tourist and visited Fort Dodge Frontier Town and Fort. There were a lot of interesting items on display in the town.

Local pioneer families donated many of the items.

The carriages were impressive even though many were in disrepair.

Bob was interested in the fort since it was one of the first to use dragoons--the horseback riding infantry that predated the cavalry.

This is a view of the fort from one of the rifle slots in the guardhouse.

Now, there was one item on display that was not fort related and that was the CARDIFF GIANT! Bob found it listed on Roadside America, so we had to see it.

 This giant man was supposedly discovered in 1869. It was, of course a hoax. This is a replica of the original.

 After touring Fort Dodge, we headed back to Sol for lunch and a rest. We were hoping the weather would clear and we would be able to get out and do more geocaching. Unfortunately, the weather stayed cloudy and misty until late in the afternoon. We found a local park where we could walk---got to get those steps! The path took us next to the Des Moines River which was overflowing the dam. If you zoom in on the picture you can see trees and limbs caught on the dam.

 As we continued on the path, we found a spot where we could see the American flag we had spotted from a nearby bridge on our way to the park. The plaque on the rock reads "Stand straight and tall, Be proud to be an American...'Old Glory'  2004"

Bob and I enjoyed our stay in Fort Dodge. It was also the first time we had boondocked since we stayed at Bretz Wildlife Lodge and Winery in Illinois.  Our next stop would be Forest City, Iowa, at Winnebago Industries to get some repairs done on Sol.