Iowa

It's been a couple of decades since I've been here, but the Maquoketa Caves were beautiful as ever. And really fun for the kids, by which I mean all of us.



At home we had a marsupial interlude, an opossum, caught, released and bewondered.



The day after the 4th I went on the Tour de Brew with Steve and Bill. You start out the ride with a beer and a card and proceed to peddle 35 miles with enough stops in between to complete a poker hand and keep you beer fueled... none of that hipper than thou PBR crap, just a choice of one of three excellent (and strong!) hand crafted beers. Prizes go to the winning hands at the end, and of course, there's more beer. Naturally, amongst the beauty of the rolling farm hills and the wind in your hair, this leads to theorizing, if not strategizing, about card distribution methodologies and the finer points of poker. Well, maybe not so natural... in a lot of ways it was a family event, I loved that about it too, though it did occur to me that truly the only way to drink beer correctly is to pair it with bicycling. A brilliant idea. Kudos to the organizers of this event.

We saw Ferdinand along the way. I guess he lives in Iowa now. I think he ate all the big flowers, but you can see there's a little one, right beneath his nose.

last beer stop
Back in the Amana Colonies I ate the best hotdog this year. Maybe the only one... whatever, it could have been a hamburger, it would have been the best one too. It was sooo good. The Beatles cover band, less so. But who cares? We had the winning poker hand...

Back at the K-ranch fam pho—