Three Faces of Iowa

I can’t give you one good reason to visit northeastern Iowa. Instead, I can name at least a dozen reasons that, taken together, make it an ideal choice for a weekend getaway. There’s the “Smallest Church in the World” in Festina and the Little Brown Church in the Vale in Nashua, as well as trails for biking, hiking, and skiing, and Pulpit Rock Campground and numerous other tranquil camping sites. Gardeners and environmentalists will enjoy the Seed Savers Exchange Heritage Farm, which preserves heirloom fruit and vegetable seeds.

During a solitary sojourn in June, I bounced between Decorah and Spillville, which are 150 miles south of the Twin Cities and thirteen miles apart, and found enough diversions and scenery to keep me happily occupied for a long weekend. Later, my children and I ventured farther south to Dubuque, a historic river town that has evolved into an all-seasons haven for families.

The journey is as important as the destination. Highway 52 south of Rochester becomes a scenic two-lane road that winds through bluff country and charming small towns that often feature Amish horse-pulled buggies clopping along the road. You’ll begin to slow down too. Here are three stops you shouldn’t miss.

Ethnicity and the Arts
Decorah bills itself as “A place to get away, without the stress of a typical vacation or trip.”

JCPenney sits alongside painted murals, handcrafted-furniture stores, the Day Spring Spa, contemporary clothing stores, and a greater variety of restaurants than you might expect in an Iowa town. The Northeast Iowa Artists’ Studio Tour, September 30 through October 2 this year, offers self-guided tours of jewelry, potting, painting, and photography studios, where artists sell and demonstrate their work (800-463-4692).

Noticing, perhaps, that I was alone, a local woman recommended Hart’s Tea & Tarts, with a comfortably elegant atmosphere and menu of salads and croissant sandwiches that attracts women in droves (563-382-3795). As I fingered the heavy silverware and admired the “Grandma’s house” touches—tongs for the sugar cubes, flower-patterned china, linen napkins in rings—I eavesdropped on a table of fiftysomething women ordering decadent desserts and comparing notes about hot flashes. The one man in the room paid studious attention to his chicken salad.

Decorah is a town with strong Norwegian roots, impressively showcased at the Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum in sixteen buildings that encompass a square block (563-382-9681). In back of the four-story museum are buildings transported from Norway or other parts of the Midwest—a century-old church, an 1879 schoolhouse, and cramped family quarters—that give visitors a realistic feeling of the immigrant experience and the hardships endured.

The you-are-there history is even more compelling in the museum itself. On display is a small ship that carried fifty-five passengers seeking to escape the overpopulation and rigid class system of late-nineteenth-century Norway. Upstairs, the story of making a home in America is told and colorful, extensive exhibits are devoted to quilts, hand-carved furniture, hand-painted dishes, and other arts and crafts.