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Welcome to Iowa, farmer boy
21st Jun 2008
Drive to Minnesota through Iowa; night out in Minneapolis

Today was a rather dull day, with a long drive to Minneapolis via Iowa.

My journey had a deliberate detour, through Iowa, as this is a state I simply wanted to dip my toes into without a full visit.  Bill Bryson put me off Des Moines with the opening line of one of his books.

Iowa is everything I expected:  farms and a grid system of roads.   Looking at the map every single road is on a matrix, even the intercity roads.  I did not complete a turn that wasn't 90 degrees during my half hour in Iowa.

There were plenty of farms, with their typical silo and Amish-like barns.  Very quaint.

South Dakota's eastern half was very much like the West - grasslands, endless grasslands.

I had arranged to couch surf in Minneapolis, but the girl, Renee, had not sent me her address, so by 9pm I needed to book a room in a hostel. As luck would have it she called me literally as I was on the phone booking a room, so it worked out well.

I arrived at her downtown house at around 10pm, and by 11pm we were on our bikes riding downtown to a nightclub on the main strip.  It was my kinda place, an old warehouse with a killer sound sysem, with a very trendy crowd.  The music was deep house, which I'd not enjoyed for years.  Up on the 4th floor of this building was the dance floor, which had been talcum-powdered to make it slippery for dancing, a simple bar and a rooftop smoking area.  Downstairs was another club room and then a cheesy pop room.

After the club kicked out at a ridiculously early 2:30 (I have yet to go to a club in the US that opens past 3am, pah) we went to an after-party.  A friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend-of-a-couchsurfer lived in a loft apartment downtown, and threw a shindig filled with very cool and flamingly homosexual guys with a distinct lack of women.   But it was a cool bash. 

Gay gentlemen have a trick that is to be encouraged.  While queuing for the toilet my heart sank as three guys went into the bathroom together in front of me.  "Oh no," thought I, "they'll be doing their gay stuff for hours and I need a pee," but in actual fact they were also just peeing, and all peed at the same time into the same bowl, thus reducing my queue time by two thirds. Great move!

We walked home in the sunlight and turned-in at 5:30, so I am rather tired right now.



Next: Lazy day in Minneapolis
Previous: Mount Rushmore; Badlands of South Dakota


Diary Photos

Welcome to Iowa, farmer boy

Typical farm, Iowa

Typical farm, Iowa

Typical barn, Iowa

Endless fields in Iowa

John Deere dealership, Iowa

Dancers, Minneapolis

DJ at the Barfly club, Minneapolis

Diary Movies

Night out in Minneapolis


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