Saving Time in a Bottle

relishing the life God has given us

Christmas 2020 – Iowa

Christmas 2020, part 2 | Iowa

After spending Christmas 2019 completely alone, the past 5 Christmases far from home, and going through all the challenges 2020 presented, all we wanted was to celebrate the holidays with family. Because of the pandemic we weren’t able to see all of our extended family, but we definitely didn’t take getting to spend time with immediate families for granted!

Curtis had about two weeks off from work, and since my family lives inside his liberty radius, we crashed at my parent’s house for the last week and a half of December. My parents were more than accommodating, giving us way too much food and driving us all over for daily outdoor adventures. The days we spent there were so relaxing; I couldn’t think of a better way to end such a crazy year!

If you’ve been reading our posts over the years, you may remember that Curtis and I have only one tradition of doing a puzzle and watching our favorite Christmas movie, Die Hard, on Christmas day. Well, my mom remembered that, so she rented it for us so we could keep the tradition going! Everyone was such a good sport about watching such a violent movie. 😉

Top – Benton County Courthouse; Bottom – Iowa School for the Blind

Besides celebrating the holidays, we went on a lot of day trips with my parents. The day after Christmas, we drove a half hour Northeast to Vinton, the county seat of Benton County. We enjoyed a walk around the courthouse and town square, then over to the Cedar River where we took time to read the informational signs about the flood of 2008. On our way back, we stopped at what was once the Iowa School for the Blind, but is now a place that teaches people to teach blind people. My dad has been painting images of significant buildings around Iowa, so we took some pictures for future a painting.

Over the following days we also went on some hikes in Wickiup Hills and Morgan Creek areas. During the time we were there, a big snowstorm came across the Midwest and we got about 6 inches at my parent’s house. Curtis and I were very excited because we had brought our snowshoes and had been waiting for a snow like this! We took Charlotte to Seminole Valley and went for a long loop hike to the Cedar River and back. There were tracks from one other snowshoer, but we were on our own for the afternoon. Charlotte had a blast dashing through the snow and bouncing between holes left from snowshoes.

After a week full of puzzles, games, and constantly being amused by the dogs, New Year’s Eve arrived. We celebrated with sushi take out from our favorite restaurant, Oyama, and had a chill night in. On January 1, we started off the year with one last day trip together with my parents. This time, we drove to Jones County to see the courthouse in Anamosa. The courthouse was pretty typical for an Art Deco building, but it turns out the penitentiary just behind the courthouse is very ornate and architecturally appealing. After that, we went for a short walk in Wapsipinicon State Park and got lunch from the General Store in Stone City.

On January 2, it was time to return to Omaha. We said our goodbyes right after lunch and began the drive home. This time, we took US-30 to the town of Jefferson, stopping to see courthouses in Tama and Story counties. After another stop in Jefferson for the Greene county courthouse and the 4 o’clock carillon bells, we drove South on IA-4 and West on IA-44 to our last courthouse of the day in Guthrie county just before sunset. From there it was a quick jump on I-80 and we were home in just an hour and a half.

Christmas 2020 – Michigan

Christmas 2020, part 1 | Michigan | Written by Curtis

For the Christmas and New Years season we decided to visit both sides of our family and spend time with them for the holidays. We have been essentially quarantined to just ourselves and Charlotte for most of the fall, so we felt that we could safely make the trip with minimal risk to others. On the Saturday before Christmas we packed our bags for a 2 week trip and left home around 7AM.

Living in Bellevue presents us with the opportunity of taking a different route to Michigan than simply I-80, or at least through Iowa and West Illinois. This time, we opted to drive straight across Iowa via US-34 end-to-end (and yes we do track those statistics as well). We had previously nabbed most of the courthouses along this route during our Thanksgiving travels, but we were able to grab the last courthouse in the line with Des Moines Co. in Burlington, Iowa.

Then we crossed the Mississippi River into Illinois and our first new county of the trip with Henderson County. A quick jog North of US-34 to the town of Oquawka got us the very quaint accompanying courthouse. We met back up with US-34 in Monmouth, IL for our third and final courthouse of the day with Warren Co. Then we drove and drove and drove following US-34 back up to I-80 and our normal route around the South side of Lake Michigan. Some day we’ll figure out a way to not follow the lakeshore in order to get into Michigan, even if it takes an entire extra day of driving to do so.

My family was glad to see us, considering we hadn’t seen each other since the derecho this past August, and that hardly counts given the circumstances. An added bonus was that my sister was at home following her first semester of college.

That Sunday, we decided to take a letterboxing trip up to a new-to-us county and drove North to Stanton, MI and the Montcalm Co. Courthouse. We looked for some letterboxes in town before heading south a short distance to some nature trails behind the Montcalm Community College. The weather was very mild for being a day before the Winter Solstice and there was only small patches of slush on the ground, but we enjoyed walking through the woods with Charlotte and my parent’s dog Sweets. We were fairly successful in finding letterboxes before having to call it a day and head back home.

Our second full day with my family was spent making and decorating Christmas sugar cookies and listening to Christmas music. In the afternoon, we decided to get some exercise and take the dogs for a walk around Sessions Lake in nearby Ionia County.

The weather was again very mild in the upper 30’s and lower 40’s so our walk was very pleasant and largely alone. Along the east end of the lake we heard and saw some form of waterfowl flying overhead. They were distinctly not Canada Geese. Later back at the car, we saw white birds on the lake, so we think they might have been swans, perhaps trumpeter swans based on the call. Also along the trail we saw a juvenile raccoon cross the path, but fortunately neither dog took much interest. Sweets set a much faster pace than Charlotte usually does, so we were done in no time and on our way home, but not before swinging through Ionia to see another Michigan Courthouse.

We spent an additional day and most of Wednesday morning with my family celebrating Christmas (albeit a day or two early). It’s hard to believe, but we have not been able to celebrate Christmas (or most holidays for that matter) with either of our families since 2015 (and even then, we celebrated a few weeks early as we were moving across the country).

On Wednesday afternoon, we packed up the car and said our goodbyes. We retraced our route back South through Michigan and around Chicago. We had thought about taking other highway roads and stopping for courthouses, but it started raining and we decided we were losing the sun too fast to get good pictures, so we stuck with the quickest route and made it to Iowa in time for dinner.

2020 in Review

On December 31, 2019, Curtis and I watched the last sunset of the year on Haleakala. Making it through 2019 felt like a huge accomplishment. We had survived our last full year attached to an active duty submarine, and would be moving away in just a few months. 2020 was the year we had been anticipating for so long, and it was finally here!

On January 1, 2020, we woke up before dawn inside our tiny tent. We drove down Haleakala and over to West Maui where we had planned some hikes for the day. After summiting Waihe’e Ridge, it began to rain lightly, causing the clay earth to become slick. “Don’t fall and twist your ankle, wouldn’t want to start the year on the wrong foot!” I joked.

Looking back at our first memories from this year is so weird. It feels like a whole different world — did we actually just hop on a crowded flight without thinking about germs or testing or wearing masks?! What was it like to gather with lots of people without worry, or to make plans confidently without considering the state of the world?

And so, at the end of the most unprecedented year (Curtis says I’m required to use that word 9 times in this post), I can’t stop thinking about how much changed. Our lives look completely different than 12 months ago, not only because of the pandemic, but also our cross country move and Curtis’ new job. Despite the year being completely unprecedented, I can’t ignore the fact that God’s protection has been over us this year, and He planned each step that got us to where we are now.

January started with our last island hop to Maui and Lanai (though we of course didn’t know it was our last at the time). We enjoyed returning to Haleakala, exploring West Maui, and hiking from sea to summit on Lanai. We returned home to Oahu and back to our routines. Curtis’ submarine was in port for the entire month, so we were able to work on house renovations, go hiking, and hang out around our hometown of Kailua.

At the end of the month, Curtis submitted his ‘wish list’ for shore tour jobs. This was, of course, before the world changed, so our top ten jobs were in Washington state, Spain, the UK, Italy, Japan, and Australia. The idea of having no idea of even which continent we’d be living in by the end of the year was thrilling to us. We were just so excited to leave this chapter in our lives behind. We were also pretty confident that because we had been given a bad deal 3 years ago, that the Navy would give us one of our top picks this time around. But since we still had to rank the 80 other jobs on the list by preference, we listed a few Midwest locations, with Omaha, Nebraska as our 11th choice.

Places Visited in 2020

Curtis left for his first ride of the year at the beginning of February. At that time, we joked that February would be the longest month of the year for us, since we’d be separated for most of the month and waiting to hear about where we’d be moving. Obviously I preferred to have Curtis home all the time, but by this point I was comfortable with being home alone. I created my own routines with plenty of things to look forward to, and filled my schedule the best I could. I tried to see this month apart as the last month I could simply enjoy island life, assuming that the next time Curtis would be gone we would have orders and I’d have plenty of moving prep to do.

Curtis returned home three weeks later, and was home for two weeks. We hoped to receive our orders during that time, but that didn’t happen. News of COVID-19 was becoming more common. I followed the news each day, growing concerned about how this could affect our move. Curtis told me over and over to stop worrying about it, everything would be fine. Then he left again at the beginning of March. Two days after he left, we were officially in a pandemic and the military issued a travel ban, which included PCS moves.

Pictures from Quarantine, Spring 2020

Even before the pandemic, I’ve used the words “isolating” and “restricting” when referring to living on Oahu. Being all alone on the island when stay-at-home orders were issued made it even more so. Hawaii’s rules were on the stricter side, to the point where I couldn’t even walk to the park down the street for over a month. However, I really don’t have room to complain. Though we were apart, Curtis and I both stayed healthy, and neither of our jobs were affected.

The highlight of the month was the morning I got the email with Curtis’ verbal orders — we were given our 11th choice of Omaha, Nebraska, and would be living close to ‘home’ for the first time in seven years! Before the pandemic we may not have received the news so well, but given the current circumstances this seemed like the best possible outcome. The best part of all this was calling my family and telling them the good news. We had no idea when this move would actually happen, but we had a new job and a new location to look forward to…sometime in the near future.

Curtis returned home once again at the beginning of April, surfacing to a whole new world. By this time I was used to the new guidelines and social distancing, but since Curtis still had to go to work every day along with everyone else on the sub, we now had to think about potentially being exposed. It was a weird couple of weeks filled with sanitizing and mask-making and trying to find ways to stay productive at home. All this was short-lived though as the sub’s plans changed and they ended up leaving mid-April for an undetermined amount of time.

Places Visited in 2020, Part 2

The ride ended up being 33 days long — the longest we were apart for the entirety of Curtis’ time stationed on the sub. Again, I can’t complain about that, knowing that things easily could’ve been much worse. My park opened up at the end of April, and that made things exponentially better for me. The park was never too busy to begin with, so it was the perfect spot for Charlotte and I to get our ‘outdoors time’ in a safe way.

At the end of May, Curtis finally returned home and his official orders finally arrived. Suddenly, everything we had been anticipating for so long was all happening at once: we scheduled a move, contacted a realtor, reserved a rental home on the island, started looking at homes in Nebraska, packed and took apart furniture, movers came and took everything away, we moved into a rental, finished our house renovations, and put our house on the market all in the month of June. Curtis also went on his last ever ride on his submarine, and we started visiting our favorite places for the last time.

Except we still didn’t know for sure when we’d be moving, since the military travel ban was still in affect and we had to wait for beaureacratic paperwork to be processed. This made us feel like we were living in limbo for most of July, each day wondering if our travel waiver would come through, wondering if we’d be off the island by this time next week? Thankfully things were starting to reopen on the island, so we were able to hike, go to the beach, and enjoy our last days of island living.

Moving!

The waiver eventually came through, and one (very busy) week later we were boarding a plane to the mainland. The only tears shed were when saying goodbye to our house…and maybe a few out of frustration, but we’ll leave that part out. Let’s just say that once we were all back on the mainland together, so much stress just melted off our shoulders and for the first time in a long time, we felt free!

We spent a week driving from the West coast to Nebraska, staying as socially isolated as possible. We camped in remote places and hiked the paths less traveled. While on the road, we celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary. Once we arrived in Nebraska, we began our two week ‘quarantine‘ before Curtis could show up at his new job. During this time, we were able to finalize our next home, buy a new car, and start finding our way around our new hometown — by that I mean our new parks and trails!

One week after our arrival, 2020 struck again with the unprecedented. Our hometown in Iowa was hit by a derecho — an inland hurricane with 140+ mph winds. My parents lost about 30 mature trees on their property, but they and their house were miraculously spared. Suddenly the desire to help my family was much greater than the concern of COVID, so we spent the last few days of ‘quarantine’ chopping up trees and dragging big branches to the roadside. We were already excited about our move back to the Midwest, but this week really showed us that this was exactly where God wanted us to be.

We returned to Omaha and moved into our new apartment in mid-August. Curtis started his new job, which is mostly remote for now, and also started a Masters Program at Penn State University in Systems Engineering. I know this may sound like a lot, but honestly I probably have more work than he does most days! Normal weekdays now look like us working in the mornings, taking Charlotte for walks at nearby parks and lakes in the afternoon, and making every meal together.

The real reason you’re here: Charlotte Collage 2020

Settling into our new home has been so easy, and we’re loving all the time we have to spend together now. We took a couple weekend trips camping in Nebraska and South Dakota, and went on plenty of day trips around Eastern Nebraska and Western Iowa consisting of old hobbies like hiking and county counting, and including some new interests such as seeing county courthouses. In case you’ve been following our courthouse pursuit and are curious, we’ve managed to see 64 courthouses since we started keeping track in July.

Another big highlight for the year has been being able to spend holidays with family again. I know this hasn’t been the case for everyone this year, but because we’ve been quarantined together for the better part of 2 months now, we felt safe spending Thanksgiving and Christmas with family. It had been 6 years since we’d been able to come home for Christmas and we were more than happy to break that pattern.

Now here we are — at the end of 2020, and despite it being so unprecedented, we still managed to do the biggest things we set out to do: we moved away from Hawaii and said goodbye to the active duty submarine life! While we’ll always be thankful for the lessons we learned during that time, and for the adventures we had on the islands, there isn’t a single moment this fall where we’ve wanted to go back. Not even when it snowed in October. We are very happy here, we’re making the most of every day together, and we’re setting lots of goals for the two years that we know we’ll be in the Midwest. Over the next couple years we’ll figure out what comes next, but for now we’re just enjoying this season — we worked hard and waited a long time for it!

Our county map for the year, made with mob-rule.com

Happy New Year friends, I hope you’re all healthy and able to see some good in the craziness of 2020, and that maybe 2021 can be a little more precedented. 🙂

Previous Year in Review Posts:

2013 / 2014 / 2015 / 2016 / 2017 / 2018 / 2019

Fall 2020 Woodworking Projects

After almost three years, our return to the mainland has meant the return of my woodworking and other tools. This naturally meant the start of new projects for the home that have been lacking or been wanting for a while.

As part of our apartment we’ve also been provided with a one stall garage which I wasted no time in setting up as a small workshop with a simple table, shelves, and a wood rack. The only issue was that the only power supply to the garage was through a single wall outlet whose sole purpose in life was to power the garage door opener and the single overhead light.

I should have known when the front office warned us that the outlets weren’t known to provide much amperage. But I was able to experiment with the lathe function of my shopsmith just fine. Sure the light turned off when you started any machine, but as soon as it was running it seemed fine.

My first project was to be a bookshelf. The $25 Target shelves that I had acquired in college simply weren’t cutting it, so we had gotten rid of them in Hawai’i. By October we still hadn’t unpacked all our tubs of books. Jess and I found a plan in a Woodsmith Magazine (a link for those truly interested in the original plan). Naturally, I promptly lost the magazine, drew up some plans from memory, bought the lumber and got to work.

And immediately ran into a road block. My primary tool for doing anything (a Shopsmith 5-in-1 machine) simply could not cut through the boards. The machine started (with the accompanying light show) and ran smoothly, but as soon as I attempted to feed wood through the saw blade, it would slow to a stop.

I scrambled for solutions. Short of running extension cords from the apartment to the garage, it was doubtful I would get the Shopsmith to run consistently, let alone any other machines that I may consider purchasing. I considered switching over to hand tools only, but rejected the idea based on the equipment I had on hand as well as immediate skill set (plus, who really likes ripping the equivalent of 70 feet to width with a handsaw).

So I began searching for Makerspaces (fully equipped public workshops) in Omaha and came across several requiring memberships, and then found one across the Missouri in Glenwood, Iowa that was a non-profit, free to use, donations only.

I took the lumber I had over, introduced myself to the caretaker/president, and never turned back. We now go there at least once a week, sometimes more. I’ll work for 3-4 hours and Jess will hang out around town and the local parks.

Now to the projects. I was able to finish the first bookshelf in about 3 weeks. My plans that I had drawn up from memory were slightly larger than the originals, but otherwise my shelves were functionally the same. The uprights are made of Red Oak and the shelves themselves made of maple with Walnut accents. I made the mistake of allowing to much clearance between the uprights and the shelves so there is some side to side wobble, but laden with books, it’s hardly noticeable.

My second project was another shelf, this one wholly my own design that I had drawn up while working nights in the fall. This was a corner shelf designed based off the perfect 5-12-13 right triangle (this is best demonstrated in that each shelf edge is 5 inches longer than the one above it and each shelf it 12 inches below the one above, and 13 inches along the diagonal). An additional challenge I added to this project was to only use the offcuts that I had on hand from the previous project – this wasn’t a problem for the vertical and diagonals, but making the shelves proved a lesson in angles and glue and made for an interesting visual effect with the grain.

I made multiple mistakes with this project, most notably cutting the diagonals to be identical. Who knew simply looking at them that they would need to be left-hand/right-hand.

In between these two major projects I’ve had opportunity to experiment with small crafts including a large cutting board made from the sink cutout from the countertops we replaced in Hawai’i. The makerspace has a complete woodshop, complete with two lathes, more clamps than is reasonable, and a CNC Router. The former has proven a source of fun recently as I’ve been experimenting with different methods for making wooden balls, to great success.

The latter, the CNC Router, is my next long term project, but more of that as it progresses. Needless to say, I am very thankful to have found Loess Hills Makerspace. It has brought me much joy, and will likely to continue to do so through the short days of winter ahead.

Prairie Rose State Park / Danish Windmill

Prairie Rose State Park | Danish Windmill | December 2020

The first weekend of December brought another sunny day with mild temperatures. To make the most of the nice weather, we planned another weekend adventure featuring a moderate amount of driving, courthouses, hiking, and scenic spots. We drove into Iowa via I-80 and, after a brief stop for a letterbox, drove North of the interstate to Shelby County and the town of Harlan for – you guessed it, a courthouse. Maybe our courthouse collecting is a bit ridiculous, but we’re making good progress on Iowa and Nebraska, and today’s were just so festive. Harlan had little loud speakers around the courthouse playing Christmas music and the downtown had such cool buildings and charm.

From Harlan, we drove East a few miles and then South to our hike for the day at Prairie Rose State Park, which is actually a lake, and less prairie. There were very few cars in the park (maybe 3 total) this late in the season, but we were interested to note that there was one person with an RV in the campground. We normally stick our noses up at RV’ers but I guess there is something to be said if they’re still out enjoying life this late in the year – we haven’t been camping since our expedition through Northeast Nebraska in October.

We started off on the trail on the West end of the lake near the dam. We reflected on how nice it was to see ‘dead things’ and shades of brown through the prairie. It’s just something you don’t get with the ‘ever green’ Hawai’i.

The trail hugged the north side of the lake shore through prairie and woods. Parts of the lake were frozen and we took time to watch the Canada geese standing out on the ice. We also enjoyed the sound the ice made when we skipped rocks across it.

Eventually the trail reached the access road. We could have made a loop trail of our hike, but it would have involved a lot of road walking and walking through the campgrounds. So we opted to go back the way we came, albeit on slightly different trails. Along the way we saw a very large buck and an opossum.

Back at the car we then continued East to the small town of Elk Horn. This small community was once known as one of the largest concentrations of Danish-Americans in the states. So much so that in the 1970’s a Danish-American arranged for the purchase of a windmill from Denmark which was shipped to Iowa piece by piece.

Curtis and his family (being part Danish) had visited the windmill while he was in high school, and were able to tour it. We declined at this point due to concerns for COVID and having Charlotte with us though.

We continued South into Cass County and the town of Atlantic for our final stop for the day, our 22nd courthouse in Iowa. We then drove US-6 to Council Bluffs and I-80 back into Nebraska.

Thanksgiving 2020

This year, we broke our longest-standing Thanksgiving tradition of eating Thanksgiving dinner on a submarine. Yes, it only happened 2 years in a row, but we’ve done something completely different every other year so it only took 2 years to make it a tradition! Not only that, but for the first time in 5 years we were close enough to spend the weekend with family. Since my family is within Curtis’ 250 mile liberty radius, we were able to go without taking leave. Because of COVID-19, we only went to my immediate family’s home. We felt comfortable doing this because we had essentially been quarantined together for over two weeks at this point, as Curtis hadn’t been to his office since the first week of November and all we ever do is go for walks or hikes and take pictures of buildings.

For our Thanksgiving drive, we…you guessed it… stopped a couple times for short walks and to take pictures of buildings. We traveled almost the entire East-West distance across Iowa along US-34. Most of the counties in the second row of Iowa have their county seats located along US-34. We didn’t make any stops though until we reached Osceola in the middle of the state, figuring that anything West of there was in reasonable day trip territory for us from Omaha. In Osceola, we stopped for an (unsuccessful) letterbox and our first courthouse for the day in Clarke County.

From here we stopped for five more counties. In order: Chariton – Lucas, County; Albia – Monroe County; Ottumwa – Wapello County; Fairfield – Jefferson County; Mt. Pleasant – Henry County. Three of these (Monroe, Ottumwa, and Jefferson) were new counties for us, and now we only have 2 remaining unvisited counties in SE Iowa.

What’s really great about living so close to home and making these trips is that someday if we move further away, we won’t have to worry about going out of our way for these Iowa counties and will be able to take direct routes. Unless, of course, we create new goals and start all over…

We made it home in time for dinner, and got to meet my family’s new dog Archie for the first time. He’s a four-month-old Treeing Walker Coonhound pup that they adopted this fall. He was very excited to have another dog to play with, but Charlotte decided very quickly that he had too much energy for her and refused to engage in playtime. He has that sweet hound dog face which is so similar to Charlotte’s and I can’t help but love him, even when all he wants to do is chew on my fingers.

My mom made an amazing Thanksgiving meal, as well as plenty of desserts, and we ate way too much over the course of the weekend. We sort of made up for that by going for walks around the neighborhood and hikes at nearby parks. We all missed being able to spend the holiday with grandparents — hopefully next year will be safer to do so!

Also while there, my parents agreed to a quick trip downtown so we could get our official courthouse picture for Linn County. Linn county is unique in that its government buildings are located on an island in the middle of the Cedar River. The only other cities to have government buildings on an island are Paris, France and Osaka, Japan. Also, we realized while visiting that the building we thought was the courthouse was actually a memorial building. We both grew up thinking that the tall building we would see while driving on I-380 was the courthouse, when in fact the actual courthouse was behind that one. At least it wasn’t just an office building!

On Sunday afternoon, we said our goodbyes and began our drive back to Omaha. This time, we only stopped for courthouses in two counties: Iowa and Jasper, in Marengo and Newton. We really enjoyed driving the quiet rolling hills and farmland of Highway 6 in contrast to I-80. My Nanna recommended seeing the Jasper county courthouse this trip as it was all decorated for Christmas, and it certainly didn’t disappoint!

Seward / Pawnee Lake

Seward, Nebraska | Hiking around Pawnee State Recreation Area | November 2020

On yet another beautiful fall weekend, we drove West for another Saturday adventure. Today’s goal was to check off another courthouse, and go for a longer hike. Perhaps all these weekend adventures are starting to sound repetitive, but they are nonetheless enjoyable to us.

We especially like that Charlotte has been able to go everywhere with us. In Hawaii, we found the weather too hot for her or the trails not as dog-friendly, so she spent most weekends at home. She may have less lizards to chase here, but besides that her life has become much more exciting.

Anyway, I digress; our first stop for today was in Seward, Nebraska. Seward is a town just North of I-80 along US-34 and is known officially (the State Government ordained it) as ‘Nebraska’s 4th of July City’ owing to its large celebrations since after the Civil War.

More importantly, for us, it’s the county seat and county courthouse for Seward County. We enjoyed walking around the courthouse and seeing the monuments. Seward (County) was named for Lincoln and Johnson’s Secretary of State, who, among other things coordinated arguably the second best land deal in history with the purchase of Alaska. Naturally, this makes Seward, Alaska Seward, Nebraska’s sister city.

From Seward we headed back East along US-34 to Pawnee State Recreation Area. We started near the dam on the South side of the Lake and proceeded around clockwise. Unlike previous hikes around lakes, Pawnee Lake does not have a complete foot path around the lake. Fortunately we were able to piece together some road walks to make it work. Along the South side of the lake we passed in and out of some old farm fields and saw several deer walking around.

The North side of the lake was more established foot paths through prairie and forest. We eventually came out near the campground to see more intrepid people than us camping this late in the season. We also ran into a pair on horseback, much to Charlotte’s fearful curiosity.

The cooler weather was perfect for our walk, yet we hardly saw any other people on the trail — just like the past few weekends. Could this mean that late fall is becoming our favorite time of year to hike here? Time will tell! Altogether, the loop was just over 7.5 miles long, and took us about 2 1/2 hours to complete. If you’re interested, you can check out our trail recording here.

Viking Lake State Park

Viking Lake State Park | Stanton and Red Oak, Iowa | November 2020

Our new home is not exactly what most would consider mountainous, which is unfortunate. But what it lacks in elevation in makes up for in water sports. Rivers, streams, lakes; there are so many things to do on the water. But as of yet we do not have a kayak (although that will change by next spring), so we must enjoy the water from the shore. Fortunately, most all the lakes near us have some form of trail circumnavigating it.

For this weekend adventure we decided to drive an hour East into Iowa to visit Viking Lake State Park, as well as knock out another courthouse.

We drove East on US-34 over the Missouri and into Iowa, past the now familiar Glenwood and on into Montgomery county. Viking Lake State Park is just South of the highway. With it being the beginning of the off season, the park was extremely empty. We saw only one other car in any of the parking lots. We parked at our starting trailhead and began our hike.

The first thing that caught our eye was a tree with very large green fruit, starkly contrasted against the bare branches. We’ve seen the Osage Orange on rare occasion but never had gotten a picture. Little did we know we would see tons on this hike. With a native habitat much more to the south (almost exclusively in Texas), the tree was introduced into the plains states as a natural hedge before the invention of barbed wire. This led to its other common name — the hedge apple. I remember in grade school, my 3rd grade teacher having one of the fruits by the window as they allegedly repulsed insects, although that has been debunked nowadays.

The trail around the lake wound around through prairie and forest and down by the lake shore. Unlike other reservoirs we’ve seen, Viking Lake also had dozens of side dams along the feeder creeks and streams creating small ponds. This supposedly minimizes sedimentation of the main lake while providing more riparian ecosystems.

Overall, the trail around the lake was just over 6 miles, most of which was on trail-like surface, but with some road walking through and around the campground. You can see our trail recording here.

Finished with our hike, we started our drive back home on US-34, but not before a couple of stops. The first was because we saw a road side advert for Stanton, IA for ‘The World’s Largest Swedish Teapot’. We’re not ones to stop for every ‘world’s largest’ attraction, but when you’ve got time… Stanton was founded by Swedish immigrants in 1870, which might explain why the lake is called ‘Viking’ Lake. The teapot in question is a water tower tastefully decorated. Every town has got to have something to brag about.

Our second stop was in Red Oak, this time to see the Montgomery Courthouse. Easily one of the nicest courthouses in Iowa. Once we’ve finished with all 99, we think we’ll have to do a top 5 or 10 favorites.

Walnut Creek in the Fall

Walnut Creek Recreation Area | October 2020

Pandemic and political drama aside, October was a pretty good month for us. For the first two weeks of the month, Curtis attended a training related to his job, which would let out early enough in the afternoon so that we could go out for hikes every day. This aligned perfectly with the peak of fall colors in our area, giving us extra incentive to get out of the apartment!

We were so excited to experience a real fall again, though I will say the colors here can’t compete with what we enjoyed in the Northeast a few years ago. There aren’t as many red or orange leaves to add variety, but we found beauty in the golden leaves and prairie landscapes for a few weeks.

Having moved to Nebraska mid-pandemic, we haven’t done hardly any of the popular things such as the zoo, botanical gardens, or any indoor attractions. We also haven’t gone out to eat at all so we don’t know what kind of restaurants are out there. However, we know many of the parks and trails in the area like the back of our hands. One of our favorite go-to spots is Walnut Creek Recreation Area in Papillion. There’s a paved path around a lake that takes about 1-2 hours for us to walk, depending on how often Charlotte wants to stop and sniff. The entire loop is about 3 miles long. We always enjoy seeing water fowl and muskrats while walking. We have gone at least twice a week since moving here. (In case anyone’s wondering, all of these pictures were taken during the second week of October, around the peak of fall colors.)

During the last week of the month, Curtis had to work a couple nights, but that was all over soon enough and definitely nothing to complain about compared to the last few years. It didn’t even get in the way of our weekend adventures!

I also turned 28 at the end of the month. It was a great day, simply because we spent it together — walking at Walnut Creek and making stir fry at home. 27 was such a weird year, obviously because of the crazy current events, but I’m thankful for the changes that happened, how I’ve grown, and how my perspectives have changed. I’d even say that I’m the happiest I’ve been here than I’ve been in a while — who would’ve thought I could say that, having moved from Hawaii to Nebraska?!

Indian Cave State Park

Hiking in Indian Cave State Park | Loess Bluffs NWR | October 2020

We reflected recently that we have only actually been living in Nebraska for less than four months. Whether it’s the routines, the reminiscence of home, a (significantly) lighter work schedule, or being on the mainland – it feels like we’ve been living in our apartment for significantly longer than just four months. And to show for it we have a county map with most of Eastern Nebraska blocked off – maybe we should slow down?

But on this weekend we decided to once again drive to new counties, new hikes, and new roads. We once again drove US75 south through Plattsmouth, Nebraska City, and Auburn through Cass, Otoe, and Nemaha counties. Outside Brownville we opted for state highways, and then rural roads leading us to Indian Cave State Park.

Indian Cave boasts over 20+ miles of trails, which in hindsight, we were next to unaware. We were mostly there to see the eponymous cave. We weaved our way through the park, eventually reaching the Missouri River. And then we were at the cave. It was underwhelming.

The cave is actually a grotto caused by erosion of the bluffs along the river. The real significance of this cave is that it has petroglyphs in the sandstone. Unfortunately, due to heavy rains, the stairs and boardwalks that allow you to view said petroglyphs were partially destroyed. So instead we had to view the grotto from the road.

Fortunately, we were easily able to fall back on hiking. We started a trail near the grotto at the end of the road (trail 11) which climbed up into the bluffs and hills along the Missouri. While not actually part of the Loess Hills, they sure seem similar.

We followed the trails up and down getting frequent expansive views to the West. We were a ways past peak fall colors, but there was still plenty of variety. Eventually, the trail started heading down back to the river….steeply. We passed plenty of families huffing their way up, all of whom made some remark about Charlotte’s hiking ability. She loves it.

Back at the car we opted to drive around the park some. We took a loop route through the old town site of St. Deroin stopping to see the old school house and some living history exhibits. St. Deroin was founded as part of a ‘Half-Breed Tract’: land set aside by the US government for descendants of European fathers and Omaha or Osage mothers. Because of societal norms, these people were not accepted by either culture, so land was set aside to allow them to provide for themselves similar to the reservation system. Ultimately all the tracts (there was one each in KS, IA, and MN) were eventually either seized by the US government, or legally abolished throughout the 19th century.

By this time it was after noon so we started driving home in our classic fashion of driving further away. We continued further South to Falls City, NE where we were able to see the courthouse for Richardson County. Then, we drove across the Missouri River to Missouri and the town of Oregon to see the Holt County courthouse.

We then started heading North towards I-29, but we made one final stop at the Loess Bluffs NWR. Just like De Soto NWR in Iowa, Loess Bluffs sits right in the middle of the Mississippian Flyway and we were still at just the right time for the water fowl migration.

We drove around the basins on the access road stopping frequently to look for birds. At one stop, we heard a commotion of birds slowly grow in volume and were able to see an enormous flock of snow geese, Canada geese, pelicans, mallards, seagulls, and who knows what else, fly across and around the basins. We simply don’t have the telephoto lens to get the really good pictures of animals so you’ll just have to believe us on this one.

We finished up our loop drive and then took I-29 North through Iowa and back home.

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