#4 Davenport

We drove the Great River Road from Burlington to the Davenport area, and it was easy to see how the road will be a lot prettier in a few seeks. Nevertheless, it was an uneventful drive with some nice farmland scenery. 

When looking for a campground, you always hope to get the perfect one and the perfect spot in it. We use a website called RV Park Reviews to see what other people think of a campgrounds and select largely based on their ratings, which have been pretty accurate. With our larger RV, here is what we hope to find:

-       30 amp electric

-       level ground with some nice scenery

-       good space between spots

-       plenty of room between spots to maneuver into the spot

-       not too many neighbors (mostly so the cats aren’t bothered by the noise)

-       some shade

Anyhow, we were lucky to find near perfect camping here at Buffalo Shores campground that is on the banks of the Mississippi. Owned and run by Scott (Davenport) County, this campground meets all of our criteria to a “T”. Our spot backs up against a sandy beach along the Mississippi River. The Ranger told us that in summer people swim here, even though there is always a pretty strong current.

Every so often we can see a barge slowly pushing down river. The barge in the first pic must have been more than 500 ft. long.

Although we aren’t big fans of reality shows, we have been hooked on a few of History Channel’s shows, like Pawn Stars and American Pickers. So we took this opportunity to visit the American Pickers store in LeClaire, just north of Davenport’s sister city, Bettendorf. Their shop has been seen on the TV show many times and in the flesh it looks just about the same, though a little smaller and less glitzy.

The shop seemed to concentrate on motorcycle and mechanical items.

Did you see the episode where Mike and Frank decided to buy Danielle some wheels as a perk? She didn’t expect this single seater with a pull starter on the dash!

Just down the street was the Buffalo Bill Cody Museum.

We felt a little misled, because only about 1/10^th of the museum was devoted to Buffalo Bill, who was born in the countryside near here. But in addition to a nice display about his life and times, there were a lot of exhibits about early American life in and around LeClaire. I liked this display from one of LeClaire Mfg.’s products that converted a reel mower to a gas driven mower. Do you remember those?

Anne wants one of these washing machines, so she can save on Electricity.

Another wing of the museum housed the Lone Star paddle wheeler, the longest continuously running steam powered boat on the Mississippi – 1869-1968.

Guests are permitted to wander throughout the three levels of the boat. Although we felt the museum was a little misrepresented, especially by the sign out front, it was definitely worth the time for a visit.

The Rock Island Arsenal is a large Military facility established in 1816 that has served as a military base, prison camp for civil war prisoners, and, since it was officially established as Rock Island Arsenal by an Act of Congress in 1862, as a 946 acre US Army military supply and manufacturing facility. The property includes the Rock Island National Cemetery, the home of the area’s earliest settler, Colonel Davenport, and the Army Corps of Engineers Lock and Dam 15 as well as the Corp’s Mississippi River Visitor’s Center.

In the early 30’s, the Army Corps of Engineers (COE) was given the task of building and operating a series of more than 30 locks and dams designed to permit cargo barges to move freely down the Mississippi, dropping about 450 feet over a 600 mile distance. You can view Lock and Dam 15 at the Corp’s Mississippi River Visitor Center. They have a number of exhibits about the Corp and the area on the first floor, but the most interesting part is the second floor where you can watch barges move through the lock.

Since an average of only about 7 barges move through the locks per day, we were lucky to be able to watch one, and the series of pictures show its progress:

Barge approaching the lock with gates closed, water in the lock is low.

Water in lock is raised and gates opened, barge enters lock.

This barge is a smaller one, pushing only 3 barges; they can push up to 15 barges, and most often, they do. Also note in the photo below that there is another vessel in the lock, a COE ship that was doing some dredging. Clearance between the barge and the COE ship was only a few feet at most on either side. It was interesting that the barge Captain told the Visitor Center folks that this was the first time he had passed through a lock with another ship in it – in his 20 years of time being a captain! And the Visitor Center officer had never seen this happen either.

Water lowered 15 feet, gates open, and barge proceeds downriver. Note the pivoting bridge section rotates 90 degrees for the barge to clear the lock. The double deck pivoting rail and auto bridge was built in 1896.

Our next stop was the Arsenal Museum.

Entering the museum, we were amazed to see a huge collection of hand guns and rifles dating back to about 1775. Books were available to the visitor that listed some information about each gun.

From its earliest days, the Arsenal was responsible for manufacturing and stocking supplies for the Army ranging from tin cups and watering bridles to refitting jeeps with 106mm recoilless rifles for the Vietnam war.  Small arms and add-on armor kits for HumVees have also been manufactured at the Armory.             Many of the museum displays illustrate the equipment that has been manufactured through the years at what today is the nation’s largest government owned and operated arsenal.

We enjoyed our time in Davenport, and for sure hope to visit the Buffalo Shores Campground again!