note:
links with a file size listed after them are links to our pictures.
links without file sizes are off-site links that are related

On May 3rd and 4th, we made an overnight trip to Boone, Iowa to say hello to the Iowa Chapter, National Railway Historical Society. The occasion was the 50th anniversary as a chapter of the NRHS. They were taking a trip on the Boone and Scenic Valley's dinner train to celebrate. We were unable to ride because we could not plan very far ahead, and the train was sold out. We did have a chance to say hello the president of the Iowa Chapter, and chase the short (2 car) train along the line. Here's a picture of the train crossing the high bridge (58k) over Bass Point Creek, and another picture of the train returning to Boone (99k) after dinner, and also a picture of our Scamp parked in the parking lot (60k).

We stayed overnight at the Don Williams Recreation Area (67k) campground, which was quite nice but had no attendant to direct us to an open campsite. We did manage to find an open site, and we paid our fee. The park has nice restrooms, including showers. It is located on Don Williams Lake behind a dam on the Bluff River. 

Sunday morning we awoke to rain (68k). We ate breakfast, listed to the national weather service radio, and waited for a lull in the showers. We enjoyed watching the neighbors take down their tent-trailer, and they had trouble backing out of their site. It was amusing watching them pushed their truck and trailer backward up the small hill out of their site to the road, in the pouring rain. The lull in the rain never happened, so we stowed everything inside the camper, and hooked up in the rain.

Leaving the campground, we went back to Boone to take another look at the Boone and Scenic Valley railroad. We say this old steam engine (73k), which was last used in the 1980's in Illinois for freight service on a shortline. We also found reminders that this line used to be an interurban railway; this old freight station (47k) is one example if the line's history.

We gassed up, and went west and saw the Kate Shelley High Bridge (34k) on the Union Pacific Railroad's main line from Omaha to Chicago. From there we took back roads to Grand Junction, Iowa, where followed a branch line railroad north to Fort Dodge. From Fort Dodge we went east and north to Eagle Grove. 4-5 miles southwest of town it was raining extremely heavily, and we encountered a bit of hail. The noise from the rain and hail made it impossible to enjoy "Click and Clack" on Car Talk on NPR. 

At Eagle Grove, the rain let up enough to allow us to photograph some very old semaphore signals (54k), and we then found a piece of clean pavement to park and eat lunch. It started raining harder, we waited a bit for the rain to let up. Since the rain did not relent, we made a dash for the Jeep in the rain.

We drove north to Forest City, where Winnebago manufacturers motorhomes. We did not tour inside the plant, but we did see many motorhome chassis ready to be turned into motorhomes. We also stumbled upon a AMC Pacer and Plymouth PT Cruiser (88k) parked in a residential driveway. Dan doesn't subscribe to the idea that the Pacer was an ugly car. It was just way ahead of it's time. Dan believes that a Pacer would make a neat tow car for a Scamp 13.

From Forest City, we drove to Albert Lea, MN where we dumped out black water tank into the city dump station. Click here for a map (114k) showing where to find it. The dump station is located in a door in a manhole cover, and has non-potable water available if you wish to flush out your holding tanks. 

All for this trip.