Since the weather has been unseasonably nice (especially for August), we decided to go off on a biking adventure to the "Quad Cities" - Moline, IL; Rock Island, IL; Davenport, IA; and Bettendorf, IA. On the way up I-55, we stopped off for breakfast at the
Lighthouse Restaurant in Rochester.
Bruce had regular pancakes, but I ordered something called a "horseshoe." Evidently this is a specialty in Illinois, because I saw these advertised at several other restaurants. Basically it's a layered dish with toast on the bottom, then bacon, a fried egg, sausage gravy, and hash browns. It's probably no different than the
Uncle Hershel's breakfast special you get at Cracker Barrel, but instead of everything being in its own spot on the plate, it's all mushed together.
Illinois has lots of little bike trails sprinkled all over the state and Rochester happened to be at the end of one called the
Lost Bridge Trail. One of the nice things about biking in Illinois is that the trails are FLAT - and I mean flatter than a pancake. We biked the whole thing (11 miles round trip) and didn't even work up a sweat.
We continued on to Moline - home of the John Deere headquarters. We didn't tour the museum (Bruce said he'd seen enough tractors growing up), but there were several on display in the outdoor pavilion. Man, those wheels are huge!
We stayed at a really nice hotel called the
Stoney Creek Lodge. It had a northwest feel to the lobby with moose statues and heavy wooden beams. The only thing they didn't have on their property was a bike rack, which was very puzzling to me as the
Great River Trail (a 60-mile bike trail running along the Mississippi) ran right next to their parking lot.
We went out to dinner the first night at
Bier Stube - a German restaurant in the historic area. They had a nice outdoor patio - quiet until the train came by, but unfortunately people were allowed to smoke on the patio. (I've gotten spoiled by the no-smoking ordinances in St Louis). Bruce had a huge pork chop; I had some other kind of pork cutlet, but my favorite items at German restaurants are always the spaetzle and the beer.
Since it was Friday night, they were setting up a sound system for a band, but we didn't stick around since they weren't playing for another couple hours. I kept wondering how the people in the apartments over the restaurant were going to get any sleep.
The next morning we got up early and headed out on our bikes to the Farmers' Market across the river in Davenport. One of the bridges over the Mississippi was supposed to have a bike lane, but I got so distracted by the beautiful views of the water that we rode right by the correct bridge. After riding all the way through Moline and halfway through Rock Island, I finally asked a jogger where the bridge was. She didn't know of one with a bike lane, but she pointed to one a little further on that had a pedestrian walkway. Unfortunately that pedestrian walkway was a 2-foot catwalk that had been tacked onto the side of a major thoroughfare. On top of that, this was a really tall bridge - purposefully high so that barges could travel underneath. Needless to say, it was a hair-raising ride, but on the good side, we were so high up that we were able to see where the Farmers' Market was on the other side.
By the time we got to the market, it was wall-to-wall people, wagons, and baby strollers. I think most of the citizens of Davenport were here shopping. We elbowed our way down one aisle and back up another, but gave up after that. I can see why people liked this market though - the vegetables were huge.
We headed on up the river on the Iowa side toward Bettendorf. I think this was the prettiest section of trail on both sides of the river. We rode all the way up to the
Duck Creek Trail (13 miles), but since this trail turned inland and we were getting hungry, we turned around.
We stopped off at the
Sailboat Club for lunch. They had a nice outdoor patio that was very popular with bikers. We saw a few people out on sailboats, but most of the boats were moored up at the marina (probably their owners were trapped down at the Farmers' Market).
On the way back down the bike trail, big as life, we saw the bridge with the bike lane. I don't know how in the world we missed it earlier in the morning, but it was much easier to get across the river. The only thing about this bridge is that it sits low to the water, so they have to open up part of it whenever a barge wants to go through (which given all the barges we saw is fairly often). We got up to the gate just as it was closing to let a barge pass. Usually, you think of bridges raising up to let a boat go underneath, but this bridge had a big trestle that turned a whole chunk of the bridge so that it was running parallel to the shore. After the barge passed through, the bridge swung back around until it was perpendicular to the shore. It was a fascinating sight to see, but I think I would have rather watched it from shore rather than the middle of that rickety old bridge.
As we crossed the bridge, we ended up on an island in the middle of the river that houses the Rock Island Arsenal. It's a huge island with lots of historic buildings. I decided to stop here and do a little sketching of this old fort and cannons.
We spent another night at the
Stoney Creek Lodge thinking we'd get up on Sunday and go for another bike ride, but we decided that 63 miles was enough for one weekend (not to mention we were both a little sunburned from being outside all day). It was a great impromptu trip - one we'll have to do again some time.
