Freeport - 2015

After heading south on Saturday, we woke up the next morning and headed north to Freeport!  This day trip has become a family favorite!  The kids start asking about a date "to go to Freeport" in April or May.  We knew that it would be later in the summer this year due to schedule conflicts over the weekends. 

We drove into Lena (a small neighboring town) to have lunch at their local drive-inn and find a few letterboxes.  We bypassed the drive-inn since they weren't open yet and headed to Lake-Aqua-Na State Park.  The trail we were supposed to head down was an equestrian trail.  It was a beautiful day (and a weekend), so there were quite a few trailers and horses on the trail...which made us decide to not try for that box.  We enjoyed the scenic drive around the park and then headed back to town for lunch.

We headed to Krape Park for our first stop.  We were excited to see a new "play area" - they had rebuilt the shelter for the old fire engine as well as a new house for the fire pole.  They also added a "town" to the play area.  The city did a great job of updating it.

We had fun riding the carousel, walking around the park, seeing the waterfall and playing in the big wooden playground.  The kids also enjoy climbing the rock wall for their annual picture.  I love looking back at the pictures from the past few years to see how the kids have grown.  I still remember the first year of riding the carousel with the twins.  Both were terrified of riding and ended up sitting on the floor!



At some point during our time at the park, Maddie got upset about something.  She wanted to be left alone...so we tried our hardest to let her be.  I ended up snapping a picture of her in front of the waterfall, but didn't notice Will, Kaitee & Alex (in background) until after we got home.

We wanted to do the paddleboats again but found out that there was an hour wait.  Lesson learned for next year!  We decided Ice Cream would be a good cure for crabbiness, so we left for the park and headed to Union Dairy. This stop is our favorite of the day! 

 

After Will finished his ice cream, he climbed into the "pretzel" bike rack.  Remember that Freeport's mascot are the Pretzels...

 

He looked so sad, that the girls had to join him to cheer him up...

We finished our time at Union Dairy by visiting the Lincoln-Douglas debate square.  Pretty soon, the kids are going to be too big for these "annual" pictures.

We left Freeport and headed a bit further north to find another Letterbox.  Unfortunately, we struck out on that letterbox too. We hit the road to head home - just in time to have the kids all take showers and head to bed, ready to start the school week the next morning. 

Looking for Lincoln - Heading South

We decided to hit the road again - this time to continue Looking for Lincoln.  We looked at our remaining Looking for Lincolns (LFL) on the map and headed to the Quincy / Jacksonville area to knock out 42 of our remaining medallions. The weather channel promised us a nice day - low 80s and no rain.  Our plan was to hit Quincy then head south to Pittsfield, Jacksonville then north to Rushville, Beardstown & Augusta.  Unfortunately, the further south we got, the darker the sky got!  After looking at the radar, we decided to do the route in reverse as it looked like the rain would be hitting Quincy first then heading northeast.  We were hoping that we would miss the rain completely...and we were right!  We got a few sprinkles as we neared Augusta to locate this LFL, but then it dissipated!  It felt good to locate these again - it's been a long time since we first started looking for them.

Next stop was Rushville.  Just as Kaitee touched this statue, the bell tolled!  I wish I had taken a picture to show her how high she jumped!  It was hilarious!

We left Rushville and headed to Beardstown - Here are the kids, enjoying the view of the Illinois River.

Our favorite town of the day was Jacksonville.  We were amazed by the size and the beautiful, stately homes.  This home was the home of Governor Joseph Duncan (1835-1838 IL Governor). This home, aside from Springfield's Governor's mansion, is the only Governor's mansion remaining in IL.

We found this statue, but no medallion, at Illinois College.

Jacksonville has a beautiful city square.  They even had music playing!  We enjoyed walking around the square and taking in all the "sights".

Becki's Great Great Great Grandfather, Robert B Wallace fought in the Civil War.  Here is Kaitee pointing out his name on the monument / statue.

There were two ferris wheel seats placed around the statue.  While researching the reasoning behind these seats (on the way home), we found out that most "ferris wheels" and "Scramblers" are made in Jacksonville by the Eli Bridge Company.

Heading west towards Quincy, we stopped in Pittsfield and found these LFL.  It was neat to read the history of Zebulon Pike as he traveled through the area and was an early explorer of the Louisiana Purchase. We have also visited Pike's Peak in Upper Iowa and Pike's Peak in Colorado - both named after the same explorer.

We ended our time of Looking for Lincoln in Quincy. We continued to be amazed by the stately homes/mansions. Quincy is located on the bluffs of the Mississippi River near Hannibal, MO (Mark Twain fame).

According to the Quincy Visitor's Guide, "The sixth of the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates was held in John’s Square (now known as Washington Park), on October 13, 1858 before an estimated crowd of over 15,000 people. It was here that Lincoln got Douglas to admit that he favored permitting the states to settle the question of slavery within their borders. This statement helped Douglas win the election for the Senate seat, but was used against him two years later when he lost the presidential election to Lincoln."



The square was huge with a lot of LFL plaques.  There was a ground "fountain" that the kids played in while we did the medallion rubbings (see sprays behind Kaitee in the above picture...also notice how wet Will is!) Unfortunately, I don't know that this square is the safest place to be in the city.  There were some questionable people walking around and Matt snapped this picture while walking around.

Back on the road, looking for the last of our Quincy LFL, we started to see trees that had been uprooted.  We had also noticed this in Jacksonville but other than the oddity of it all, didn't think twice about it.  It seemed that the trees in Jacksonville were all along the street / sidewalks. They were completely uprooted and the sidewalks were uprooted as well.  It was the strangest thing to see (of course, I didn't get a picture of those!) because it didn't seem like there was any property damage. While in Quincy, we started to see the devastation of a strong storm that had come through a few weeks earlier.  Here is one of the historic buildings downtown.

We headed down towards the river and got mixed up in the tangle of crowds who were heading to the river front to enjoy an outdoor concert. 

We ended our day at Woodland Cemetery in Quincy.  It was sad to see the damage done by the storm.  It is a beautiful cemetery, full of history, beauty and a view of the Mississippi River.  Unfortunately, it took the brunt of the storm. There is still so much to clean up, including broken headstones and trees.

Notice this headstone - the top half is on the ground behind the main part - which has moved from the base.

Take notice of the top of the monument in the upper left corner.  It is just barely hanging on.

 

This tree fell across the road. 

We found some dinner then started to head home. It was a long day, but we enjoyed our time together...learning the history of Lincoln and Illinois once again.