LeClaire a river town adventure

Allie had never been to LeClaire, Iowa so I had fun heading to this beautiful little river town situated along the banks of the Mississippi. Allie and I took a hosted trip to the Quad Cities area and it was great spending time with my grown up daughter and doing the things we enjoy.

Our first LeClaire Stop was at the LeClaire Information center where Cindy Bruhn, the Tourism Manager took a few minutes to tell us a bit about the area.  “The area was once where river boat captains and pilots would navigate this 15 mile stretch of rapids for Mississippi riverboats,” Cindy explained.

Today the rapids are calmed, but a lot of history remains. If you stop, get the Explore History! A Guide to the Historic Sites & Homes of LeClaire, IA to get the history low-down.  While I knew a bit about William F. Cody a.k.a. Buffalo Bill who was born in LeClaire and later became a frontiersman and US Army Scout before opening his “Wild West Congress”.   I didn’t realize that members of the Sauk and Fox tribes lived in the area or the history of the houses that the book explains.

The history that Allie wanted to see was the Antique Archaeology store of American Picker fame.  We enjoyed the variety and fun decor and I had never seen the expansion.  We stopped in antique stores and just enjoyed shopping up and down the quaint streets.  It was the eclectic and fun items that Allie really enjoyed. After the heat got the better of us we took a drive around town and I found a cool little park that you had to take a ski lift type hill to get up to the top.

We had a chance to dine at Bierstube, an authentic German fare restaurant.  I had been to Sneaky Petes which is a fun option, but the German fare won out. We  were not really hungry, so we decided to go for appetizers and had pretzels, potato pancakes and shared a piece of Black Forest cake.  Yum!

LeClaire offers a nice variety of places to stay.  I would love to come back and have either a romantic getaway for a girls weekend in one of the cool bed and breakfast options.  Whatever you are looking for whether history, antiques, dining or shopping, you can find it!  Log onto www.visitleclaire.com for more information.