Road Trip
- TheBetterHalf
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Last week Cute promised you I would write about exciting Des Moines. I’m sure you’ve been waiting anxiously ever since.
We went there for a car thing as some of you may have guessed. There’s nothing I like more than riding in a car for several hours, going to a car thing that promises hundreds of old, classic, plus new cars to see, listening to an ex-race car driver talk, and mixing with 300 pretty rabid car owners. All of this sponsored by the Des Moines Schonesland car club.
To his credit, Cute did try to make it as painless as possible by taking the long way to Des Moines because he wanted to meander along the scenic route. You may think, as I did, that this is ironic or oxymoronic if not impossible, but I will say that we saw lots of green corn fields, green trees and green rolling hills. It certainly was prettier than Western Kansas.
I haven’t been to, nor really thought about, Des Moines for a long, long time. In fact, it was when I lived in Des Plaines, outside of Chicago, and wondered why that city wasn’t pronounced De-plain like Des Moines other than the obvious. I have never solved that mystery.
I did learn on this trip that Des Moines was named for the Moingona tribe of Indians who lived there and it was the French who cut their name down to Moin; traders went to “les pays des Moins” (the land of the Moins). Anyhow, we stayed at the east end of downtown, which is kind of like a better midtown Kansas City with a nearby river, lots of bars, restaurants, and more cute shops than we have.
My friend Jill, whom I met years ago through Les Dames des Escoffier (pronounced ledam deescoughe-a…see the pattern here?) recommended several great places for us to eat. Our first night there, unable to make a decision, we ate at three different restaurants, including the best one, Clyde’s. Lots of people, lots of music, and clearly lots of very good food (not pictured below).
Yep, we were not too hungry the next day but we had lunch with the car group, catered by one of Des Moines’ best barbecue joints, Smokey D’s. They provided the food at the cool distillery where the car event was held. We listened to a great jazz/blues group, The Soul Searchers, while we ate. Then, still not hungry, but still persevering, we went to a fabulous little wine and cheese shop, cleverly called The Cheese Shop, and had a lovely charcuterie board.
Back to the hotel to at least rest our stomachs before we headed out again to an historic hotel, Hotel Fort Des Moines, which had a very well recommended restaurant called Proudfoot & Bird. Although our stomachs were saying not again, not again please, we at least heeded them somewhat and just sat at the bar and split some apps. The appetizers were very good and we thought, if only we were hungry…
Early Sunday found us back in Cute's car and after a much lighter breakfast at our hotel, followed by several Tums, we headed to I-35 and tootled back home.
My take from all of this was that we had met some very nice people at the car celebration. Des Moines has some 500 plus restaurants and bars; and Downtown is really a “happening scene,” if people say that anymore. They probably don’t so you probably can’t take my word that it was happening. But for a smaller city (population about 214,000), Des Moines takes advantage of their riverfront, has several museums and art galleries, a large botanical park and several other tourist venues we missed seeing.
Des Moines is only 194 miles away and if you’re looking for a fun one or two day escape from Kansas City, you should consider it. We need to go back.
P.S. Not interested in cars or Des Moines? Well, here's a dove update: the two additional eggs hatched a few days ago bearing two live birds. Now that's exciting!
And they are hungry!