in Forest
City, Iowa
September 16 -19, 2009
September 16 -19, 2009
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in Forest
City, Iowa September 16 -19, 2009 |
| Welcome to Forest City, Iowa which is often called "the smallest big town in Iowa". With a population of 4,500 people in 4.2 square miles. Forest City is a city in Hancock and Winnebago Counties in the U.S. state of Iowa, and the county seat of Winnebago County. It is the headquarters of Winnebago Industries, which manufactures motorhomes. It is also the home of Waldorf College, a small college affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Forest City claims to be the smallest city in the United States with its own YMCA. Pilot Knob State Park is located a few miles east of the city. Forest City Community Schools operates a wind turbine that provides 60% of the energy needs of elementary, middle, and high school. | |
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Below: The Visitor Center
- and a cute LITTLE RV that says "THINK BIG"
on the back of it. |
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| Below: The Visitor Center building and a miniature recreation of the visitor center building that can be seen inside the visitor center. | |
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Below: Inside the visitor
center |
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Although, the two RV Gypsies RV was obviously able to be driven, it was under partial warranty and needed some things fixed. The two RV Gypsies had an appointment at the Winnebago Repair Factory and they arrived in Forest City a day ahead of time, so they had to find a campground for the night. |
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Below: Three Fingers Campground
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The new yard of the two RV Gypsies
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Below: The view from their front window |
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Below: The view from behind
the RV of the two RV Gypsies |
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Below: Looking at the RV from the lake
area |
This is pretty in the lake, but the USA flag was not in good condition. SHAMEFUL! |
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Three Fingers Campground was nice with water and electric hookups and 50 amp electrical; but if you have a big RV, be sure to have a reservation, as big spots seem to be filled constantly by local people. On the other side of the lake, there were several spots for really small RV's. The lake is pretty big, and they have two old paddle boats campers can use for free, which is a very nice way to spend an afternoon. Full hook-ups but No cable, No Wi-Fi. |
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| NOTE: As mentioned above, the two RV Gypsies were in Forest City, Iowa to have repairs done to their RV at the Winnebago repair center. So once they put AWO in at the factory, they had to find things to do in the area, and there was not a lot of choices. It took three days and a lot of money for repairs not covered by warranty. Winnebago had some parking spots just up the hill from the repair center for each night, but not enough, so it was hurry hurry hurry to get a spot. Sites had electric hook-ups and free, unsecured Wi-Fi. The two RV Gypsies and all other RVs needing repair MUST
have the RV at the repair center by 7 A.M. Customers
must be back at the repair center by 3 P.M. because they
close at 3:30 P.M. After picking up their RV each afternoon, the two RV
Gypsies parked their RV back up on the hill (spots were not reserved)
for the evening and repeated the procedure the next morning until repairs
were done. |
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| Below: The two RV Gypsies, found a very small park in Forest City with a neat suspension bridge. Each slab of wood had someone's name engraved on it. This was the ONLY thing the two RV Gypsies found interesting in the area on this date. | |
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Below: The view from each
side of the small suspension bridge. |
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| Below: The two RV Gypsies had dinner at The Lodge for Lee Duquette's birthday, and lunch there on the next day. It was good food at a reasonable price, decent service, and a nice view from the veranda. Forest City had decent food at several places. (They obviously could not eat in their RV while it was in repair). | |
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| Karen Duquette chose to go the the local YMCA and use their hot tub, swimming pool, steam room and sauna. At a visitor's cost of $10 daily, it was well worth it. Karen also got a nice massage at the YMCA, at an additional charge, of course. The director/manager of the YMCA saw Lee Duquette in the YMCA waiting room waiting to pick Karen up and introduced himself to Lee. He was extremely pleasant, as was Sharon, the front desk person, and the female lifeguard. The Manager gave Karen a YMCA pin, plus a free pass for the next day, which she did use. A very pleasant YMCA. | |
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and a rose for Brian Lee Duquette at the memorial
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