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We visited God's country

S

Shortgrass

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Sep 25, 2006
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Location
Eastern Colorado
Our daughter is a 4th of July baby, so we took off and visited her family in their new digs for her birthday. They have moved to New Albin, Iowa. It is on the Mississippi River, and you can see the Minnesota border from their home. Really pretty and very productive country.


The birthday girl and family by Old Glory.


The back yard view


The grandson is playing baseball, and had a game while we were there.


My son-in-law is pastor of this church. It seems like a good fit for the shepherd and the flock

The area has many bluffs and valleys dotted with productive farms. Hogs, Cattle (beef and dairy) as well as corn, hay and beans are numerous. A saw mill is there also to support a logging presence.

Beef cows


Hay ready to bale






Some of the Iowa River bottom fields had flooded about two weeks ago, and either destroyed the planted crops or prevented planting. This field is on Winnebago Creek.






The Mississippi is a big river, and this is just the southern edge of Minnesota. It looks to be a mile or more wide right here.[/img]

We are now back in this desolate place, and I'm scratchin' my head wondering why any one ever settled here :???: :???:! It must have been a good year, or he would have just turned tail and left!!
 
The weather was pretty nice while we were there. The morning we left (4:00 am), it was so humid, you could slice it, and they expected rain. It sure wasn't humid when we got home :lol: .
 
Shortgrass, thanks for the great 'tour'. Nice to see photo's of your family and their 'place'. So pretty, and it looks like a nice little church. We still are able to keep up our 'elderly' old style country church in Midland, but its days are probably numbered, so far as the original part (sanctuary) is concerned, but believe the congregation is good for the long haul. Previous members did build an addition for an education/expansion for big crowds space years ago, so we have adequate space for our needs. Seeing such a neat, easy to maintain building could almost make me envious. Then, I think about the nostalgia of our little, old, well cared for church home, with antique furnishings either given by members, or purchased from distant congregations with new churches, and all the fun and stories of the rather difficult trips to bring the treasures home..........and hope what we have lasts forever!

The Mississippi is such an interesting river. We have seem most of it from St. Louis to Jackson, MS, and in the New Orleans area. I sure would like to see the stretch from Jackson to Natchez, and on down to New Orleans and also the north end from St. Louis at least to the home of a cousin of mine who lives above the Twin Cities, maybe near Little Falls. I know it is much smaller there, to the point her brother calls it "the crick".

So much of that river is sort of distorted with those locks and dams all the way from "The Cities" to the Gulf. Relatives in MS once took us to tour a very interesting park called Mud Island in the river at Memphis. The drainage of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers was depicted, first with a wall mural depicting the northern reaches, on a sort of relief map, with water flowing down, calibrated to mimic actual flows. I don't recall where the part on the wall fell into the channel created on the ground, with some of the larger tributaries also depicted, if I remember correctly. It entertained us for all the time we could take before our flight back home after visiting the relatives 'down south' quite a few years ago.

Thanks again for sharing.....and for triggering the memories of fun times with my now deceased aunt and uncle in 'the south'.

mrj
 
Shortgrass i sure had a great laugh when i read.....We are now back in this desolate place, and I'm scratchin' my head wondering why any one ever settled here ! It must have been a good year, or he would have just turned tail and left!! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

My Great Great Grandfather and i are sure gonna have a serious visit when i reach the otherside. :D Thanks for the tour and the laugh this morning.
 
We were back in Iowa on the family farm near the Mighty Mississippi a couple weeks ago, and it sure is a change. But, out here your hay hardly ever gets rained on (standing or cut), the grass is stouter, the bugs and air are less thick, and every night it cools right down with that big ol' purple Peak sitting in the back ground watching night fall. It might be a dry and desolate country, but while my cousins are cussing rain, I'm out thanking God for it.

Somehow I think you appreciate life, water, and the color green more when you're out on the high plains. Makes you think the Creator must be a pretty intelligent feller to have made a class of grass and stock that can thrive on so little.
 
mytfarms said:
We were back in Iowa on the family farm near the Mighty Mississippi a couple weeks ago, and it sure is a change. But, out here your hay hardly ever gets rained on (standing or cut), the grass is stouter, the bugs and air are less thick, and every night it cools right down with that big ol' purple Peak sitting in the back ground watching night fall. It might be a dry and desolate country, but while my cousins are cussing rain, I'm out thanking God for it.

Somehow I think you appreciate life, water, and the color green more when you're out on the high plains. Makes you think the Creator must be a pretty intelligent feller to have made a class of grass and stock that can thrive on so little.
Click to expand...

Right, you are!
 
Shortgrass, if you would have let us know you were taking a detour through the Sandhills (God's Country) we could have met up for lunch. I see you had important stuff to do in Iowa though, you probably didn't have time. Glad you enjoyed your family.
 
flyingS said:
Shortgrass, if you would have let us know you were taking a detour through the Sandhills (God's Country) we could have met up for lunch. I see you had important stuff to do in Iowa though, you probably didn't have time. Glad you enjoyed your family.
Click to expand...

One of these trips, maybe we can meet with some of you sandhillers on the way through. Does Cody still have a cafe? Is Dick's still at Nenzel? We'd have to detour up north, off I80, but it's a favorite drive of mine and not terribly out of the way. You won't get any argument out of me about Sandhills and "God's country" :wink: .
 
Shortgrass said:
flyingS said:
Shortgrass, if you would have let us know you were taking a detour through the Sandhills (God's Country) we could have met up for lunch. I see you had important stuff to do in Iowa though, you probably didn't have time. Glad you enjoyed your family.
Click to expand...

One of these trips, maybe we can meet with some of you sandhillers on the way through. Does Cody still have a cafe? Is Dick's still at Nenzel? We'd have to detour up north, off I80, but it's a favorite drive of mine and not terribly out of the way. You won't get any argument out of me about Sandhills and "God's country" :wink: .
Click to expand...

Husker Hub is in Cody. Pretty good food. I'm not sure when Dick's closed. It was before our time, and that has been 6 years.
 
Thanks for the tour Shortgrass.

My wife and girls just got back from Iowa also. The went to visit some friends of ours near Centerville.

I got to stay home and AI cows :roll:


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