hobart to quad cities Iowa

Today we left Indiana and travelled across Illinois to the Mississippi River at the Quad Cities. We bypassed Chicago and travelled west along I-80. Our first stop was in Ottawa—we chose Ottawa because of the name and it turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Ottawa was established in the 1800’s and has a beautiful town square called Washington Square. It is not only beautiful with all the green space and flowers but it is also a historical area. On August 21 in 1858 the first of the great debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas was held in Washington Square. These great debates revolved around a single sentence in the Declaration of Independence—“all men are created equal”. The park is well used today and we were fortunate enough to be there for their farmer’s market . We enjoyed our short visit and even found a canal running thru the centre of town—the Illinois Michigan canal once served as a vital link in the transportation system—it is not used as such today but they do skate on the canal in winter when it freezes over! We drove a short distance from Ottawa along the Illinois River to Utica where the state park Starved Rock is situated. Exploring the bluffs and canyons is the park’s primary attraction, and there are 13 miles of well marked trails . We did take time to have our walk in the park and we were rewarded with beautiful views of the Illinois River, the dam and the lock system as well as the beauty of the canyon . We did not begin to explore all the trails but were very happy that we had the time to stop and enjoy. The park was once occupied by the French and it was Louis Joliet and Father Jacques Marquette who established Fort Louis here in 1682. The fort was abandoned by the French but the fort continued to be used by fu traders and trappers. The fort is no longer there. In 1769 a band of Illinois Indians took refuge on the summit of the rock, where surrounded by their foes, they died from lack of food and water and hence the name Starved Rock. After our time in the park we went back into the village of Utica and had lunch at the local tavern where we had been told the burgers and chips were delicious—we were not disappointed.

We carried on to the Quad Cities on the Mississippi River. The Quad Cities is made up of the riverfront cities of Davenport and Bettendorf in Iowa, and Moline and Rock Island in Illinois. We do like being near water it seems. We visited the John Deere Pavilion in Moline (from the French word Moulin meaning Mill)—the building contains vintage and modern-day Deere equipment, along with interactive agricultural exhibits. John Deere was a blacksmith in Vermont and moved to the Midwest where he heard there were great opportunities. He fashioned a self cleaning steel plow in 1837 using steel from a broken saw blade to replace the cast iron plows. Soil clung to the bottom of the cast iron plow and had to be removed by hand. This was the beginning of the largest agricultural manufacturer in the world. We saw some of the old vintage machines in the collector’s club too. We also tried to visit the Mississippi visitor centre but were refused entry as it was located on an active US Army facility on Rock Island Arsenal. Americans are allowed entry but not Foreign visitors.

We are now getting ready to go north and west so it ought to be Iowa and Minnesota tomorrow.