Iowa - Day 15 - west and south, Waterloo to Council Bluffs

Gretna/West Omaha KOA, Gretna

Tuesday, 15 November 2022

today's route

I spent most of the day driving through parts of Iowa I'd planned to see, but I'd planned to see them at a much slower pace.  My plan had been intended to compensate for the snow I'd expected to find on the roads and take short hops for several days.  First I'd intended to leave Waterloo tomorrow, drive through Ames and see the campus of Iowa State University, and then go on to a state campground.  The next day I'd planned to drive to nearby Dolliver State Campground that was said to have unusual geographic features.  From there I'd go to a state campground just outside of Sioux City, so I could drive around the city a bit.  Then head south to Council Bluffs and east from there.  

Instead the current weather report said I'd likely leave the snow when I got to the western part of the state, which was good news, and I planned to drive slowly where there was snow, despite Google telling me I had a nearly 5-hour drive planned.  

When I left the campground at 8:00 (I wanted to wait till the roads had warmed up a bit), there was about an inch of snow on the ground.  But the roads were clear, thank goodness, though I still took my time over bridges.  There was a long one over the Iowa River.

I had plenty of time to listen to the radio and was lucky enough to get NPR for at least the first part of the drive.  I heard about a program for elementary-aged kids called Feel Your Best Self.  It's a program used in schools using puppets to help kids work through their feelings and figure out a way to express them constructively (I think that's it).  There's a companion program for families to try at home, and it sounds very useful.

In the On Point segment, I heard about an article in The Verge titled "Welcome to Hell, Elon."  It's about how Elon Musk may still not have figured out just what situation he's gotten himself into with his purchase of Twitter, and it sounded interesting enough that I looked it up.  The article is better than it sounded, and I learned a lot about social media I'd never even thought of.  For instance, the only real asset of each of those companies is the users; the product is content moderation; the revenue source - advertisers - won't pay unless they're assured of safety for their brand.  And Musk is in an unusual position because not only is Twitter world-wide, but so is Tesla, which makes one of them a potential hostage to the other.  If you'd like to read it, here's the link.   https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/28/elon-musk-twitter-acquisition-problems

Just as predicted, it stopped snowing west of I-35.  I'd been driving through sometimes blowing snow for quite a way, so it was a relief to get better visibility.  Especially because I hadn't been able to see any of the Iowa countryside I was driving through and had wanted to see.  With snow covering everything, it looked like I was seeing a white ocean with islands of trees.

I saw the remains that were just getting cleared away of what had apparently been a really bad one-car wreck.  The area around it hadn't been plowed, of course, and I could see what the road I was on would look like without snow plows.  It reminded me of those signs I saw in rest areas in Montana talking about snow plow operators being heroes.  I agree.

I saw a water tower that had those oblong things that are on cell towers hanging from it.  I guess the water tower was the highest point in the area, and the local residents wanted technology.

We took a break at the city park in Knierim, a town so small you'd have trouble finding it on that road map above, even if it were blown up large enough.  By this time there was almost no snow in sight, which surprised me.

I've noticed before, and again today, that several farmhouses have their own solar panel grid set on a separate framework.  Maybe they'd planted so many trees around their houses to break the wind that they couldn't get enough sunlight and had to build these frameworks separately to position them where there was sun.

Somebody on the radio said that minimalism is a response to the fact that we live in chaotic times.  Maybe so, though I'm not sure minimalism is a current trend.  On the other hand, there sure are a lot of people living full-time in their RVs these days.

I turned to head south on US-70 and saw a sign telling me to turn right for Sac City, where I'd find the "world's largest popcorn ball."  Not sure I'm so enamored of popcorn balls I'd make a separate trip, but if I find myself back in the neighborhood it definitely would deserve a notice.

The weather report on the radio told me the snow would be sticking around all over the east and central parts of the state, but not in the west.  And I wasn't seeing any in the west.  My route plan turned out to be a lucky choice.

But I didn't have to see either snow or landscape to smell.  They use manure on cropfields out here too.  Maybe chicken manure - I saw several large chicken farms.

Many of the farms are terraced, and I realized I hadn't seen terraced fields in the eastern part of the state - only out here in the western part.

I crossed the West Nishnabotna River, and then the East Nishnabotna River three times, and then the East Branch of the West Nishnabotna River.

The farther south I went the more snow I saw on the ground.  It seemed odd that there was plenty of snow down south and almost none up north.

By the time I hit I-80 it was snowing again (which may explain why I was seeing it on the ground), but it didn't seem to be sticking.

An Iowa license plate said GMATRKY.  I still haven't figured out what that means.  Some kind of turkey?

And then we were back in Nebraska, passed through Omaha, and were back at the Gretna KOA where we'd stayed twice last month.