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Upper Iowa River Valley
Limestone cliffs rise like a towering beige wall, as a great blue heron takes flight above the Upper Iowa River in the northeast corner of the Hawkeye State. The river, which flows into Iowa near the town of Chester, courses 35 miles southeast through the historic county seat of Decorah (80 miles northeast of Waterloo) and near off-road bicycle trails. Then, it curls northeast to the Mississippi.
You can canoe a 30-mile section of this river on two easygoing stretches: From Kendallville (northwest of Decorah), paddle southeast to the town of Bluffton; from Bluffton, continue southeast to Decorah. Fast riffles alternate with quietly swirling pools. Rolling around U-shaped bends, the river reveals bluff views. Eagles and hawks soar overhead.
Just upriver from Bluffton, horseshoe-shaped bluffs stretch before and behind canoers. The clear cascade of Malanaphy Spring gushes from the riverbank into the wide channel farther downriver. Along the way, you glide beneath iron truss bridges built more than a century ago.
Bicyclers on the Prairie Farmer Recreational Trail can pedal an 18-mile rail-trail northwest from an old railroad depot in Calmar (10 miles south of Decorah). Shaded by sumacs dressed for fall, the trail eases by farm country before passing through tiny Ridgeway.
Some bicyclers rarely stray from Decorah's dozen city parks, with 15 miles of linked trails. Pedaling is easy on shady paths that skirt picnic tables and playgrounds. Decorah's tidy homes and church steeples peek from the autumn-tinged hills, as the river rolls by.
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Reviewed April 2004.
