Saturday, July 13, 2024

Which Wolf Wins & The Last COE

 Location: West Overlook COE Campground; Iowa City, Iowa

There are two wolves inside all of us.

They are constantly fighting each other.

One is darkness and despair.

The other is light and hope.

We should always be asking ourselves......

Which Wolf Wins ???

(The answer is at the end of the post. Ponder on the question for a while before looking) I read this a few days ago and it's had a pretty good impact on me so I wanted to document it in the blog. 

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This is the 13th Corps of Engineers campground on this trip and sadly my last for a while. I haven't made reservations for my return trip to Louisiana after the FROG Rally in Goshen, Indiana during the week of August 11th so I may be able to stay in some on the way back. I've stayed at this COE before, back in 2016. Wow, 8 years. But one of the great things about a blog is that I can re-read what I wrote back then and immediately be transported mentally and emotionally back in time. I'll post the link to that post instead of re-writing all of the same information. Here's the link >> Old Blog Post

 I think I made the link correctly, if not, the date of the post is August 22, 2016 and you can go to it by using the archive listing on the right side of this post.

I was greeted with a nice sunrise before hitching up. That campground was great for both sunrises and sunsets. I'll try to remember that.

More southern Iowa highways. Years ago, a few people requested these types of pictures so they could see the change in landscape. I don't know if they are still following the blog or not.

Our campsite on the left with Coralville Lake in the background

The view of the lake out my back window. Lots of boats on the water today.
 
The emergency spillway for the dam. Imagine 5 feet of water flowing over it for 28 continuous days. Just a hint about what's in the old blog post.

This is looking downstream from the emergency spillway. That is the bedrock with fossils that was exposed after the Flood of 1993.
This is from the fossil gorge looking back at the spillway. I'm standing on the bedrock with fossils.


This is from the visitor's center, which was closed, looking down on the dam/lake. This is the same place I took a picture back in 2016. The difference is now there is a bench but before there was a swinging bench.

Iowa City is the hometown of the University of Iowa. One of the most famous recent graduates is Caitlin Clark. She is a rookie in the WNBA for the Indianapolis Fever. I've seen a lot of video of her lately and really enjoy the way she plays the game. I'm not going to get into it any more than that, but if you see some of her highlights, think of Magic Johnson and Larry Bird. 

I went to the Museum of Natural History located on the college campus. It is an urban campus and everything looked great. You can feel the pride everywhere. I like going to Natural History museums to see what the latest tricks are to make me believe something that, according to "them", happened 375 million years ago. The museum is laid out well with nice looking displays. The building itself was one of the most interesting things for me to explore. It was worth the 1 1/2 hours I spent exploring it. I'm also glad I saw downtown Iowa City and the campus. It is a good vibe location.

This is the only picture I'm posting from the Museum of Natural History. It is an Ice Age Giant Sloth. A sloth is one of my grandson's favorite animal. Maybe someday in the future, 20 or 30 years from now, Nate will read this blog post and know that I was thinking of him when I posted this picture. 

 

Tomorrow is moving day and I'll be entering Illinois for a 3 day stay at one of their state parks. The tow will only be a little more than 100 miles with almost all of it being on I-80. I think it will be nice to be back on the interstate system again. My route so far has avoided the interstate because the FHWA didn't build any interstates where I wanted to go. Oh well, we'll see how it goes. I do remember a lot of the interstates in Illinois and Indiana were rough and bumpy. 

Answer: Whichever Wolf you Feed !!

Ya'll take care of each other. Maybe I'll Cya down the road.

4 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. I'm safe most of the time Barney. You have a great time planning your next trip.

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  2. Always enjoy your blog. Vern@Boise

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Vern. I sure enjoyed the northwest but don't know when I'll be back up there.

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