"Remember that sometimes not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck." This certainly applied to us this weekend. Every camper with even a little experience knows that the chances of getting any campsite on a holiday weekend decline astronomically the closer you get to that holiday. So much so that many get on the phone or computer to make reservations a few minutes after midnight on the day the reservation window opens. For Iowa State Parks that's 90 days; most other states are six months. Of course, there are a lot of non-reservable sites--especially in county parks, but also half of the state park and Corps of Engineers sites. Since most of our regular group is retired, we figured we could grab some of those sites in the middle of the week.
We could not have been more wrong. Our plan was to head to Morgan Creek, a wonderful county park near Cedar Rapids, on Wednesday morning to get sites. I should mention here that it has become commonplace for some people to haul their campers to such a park early in the week and pay for a site for an extra four or five days in order to have a spot for the weekend. Many such places look like RV dealers at those times with sites full of unoccupied campers. On Tuesday of this week, we began to consider that possibility and made a plan that one person would head to Morgan Creek at 7:00 am Wednesday, grab three sites, pay for them, and put a very small tent on each until we could get there with our actual equipment midday. Meanwhile, I would wait at home for a call that either said "Got 'em!" or "nothing here." If the latter, I would head to Saulsbury Bridge fifteen miles away. Meanwhile, the other person would stop at Palisades on the other side of Cedar Rapids and check on the walk-in sites there. The result was that by 8:30 am, we knew that there were no sites left at any of those places.
However, the night before Butch had been looking at a few commercial parks on line. Among those was the Amana Colonies RV Park. We normally shy away from commercial parks. They are more expensive and often do not have grass, trees, grills of fire rings--they are nothing more than parking lots with hook ups. This one is definitely short on trees and is basically a huge field with hundreds of sites laid out in rows. But we really wanted to camp and besides we already had our campers filled with food and clothes. So as soon as I found Saulsbury full, I called Butch and he called Amana, snagging three reserved sites. We were disappointed but only had ourselves to blame.
We could not have been more wrong. Our plan was to head to Morgan Creek, a wonderful county park near Cedar Rapids, on Wednesday morning to get sites. I should mention here that it has become commonplace for some people to haul their campers to such a park early in the week and pay for a site for an extra four or five days in order to have a spot for the weekend. Many such places look like RV dealers at those times with sites full of unoccupied campers. On Tuesday of this week, we began to consider that possibility and made a plan that one person would head to Morgan Creek at 7:00 am Wednesday, grab three sites, pay for them, and put a very small tent on each until we could get there with our actual equipment midday. Meanwhile, I would wait at home for a call that either said "Got 'em!" or "nothing here." If the latter, I would head to Saulsbury Bridge fifteen miles away. Meanwhile, the other person would stop at Palisades on the other side of Cedar Rapids and check on the walk-in sites there. The result was that by 8:30 am, we knew that there were no sites left at any of those places.
However, the night before Butch had been looking at a few commercial parks on line. Among those was the Amana Colonies RV Park. We normally shy away from commercial parks. They are more expensive and often do not have grass, trees, grills of fire rings--they are nothing more than parking lots with hook ups. This one is definitely short on trees and is basically a huge field with hundreds of sites laid out in rows. But we really wanted to camp and besides we already had our campers filled with food and clothes. So as soon as I found Saulsbury full, I called Butch and he called Amana, snagging three reserved sites. We were disappointed but only had ourselves to blame.
On the plus side, there is a lot of grass, the sites are spacious, and we do have a fire ring. Yesterday was one of those rare perfect days--low 70s temps, light winds and blue skies. We took off in the morning and drove a mile or so into Main Amana. There we wandered the shops and had pastries and beverages at the bakery. One gift shop had a wide display outside of bedding plants and interesting yard art. A must-stop is the furniture factory where incredible pieces are crafted and finished of common and unusual woods. Our last stop was the meat market. The main street is still decked with May poles left from the Maifest earlier this month.
After we returned to the campground, we got our bikes out and rode the pleasant bike trail through rolling hills to Middle Amana and back. Supper was followed by a nice campfire. In another little twist of fate, we discovered our campground hosts had lived in West Liberty and that she is actually a second cousin of Butch and his sister. The only fly in the ointment, so to speak, were June bugs. The darker it got, the more they appeared to want to eradicate us from the earth. We finally surrendered and retired for the night.
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